Description
Jeanne Hébuterne in a White Chemise is a canvas of 1919 held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York under inventory number 56.184.2. Jeanne Hébuterne, the painter’s partner, sits in a white chemise with narrow straps, her arm resting on the mustard-yellow back of a chair and her hand raised to her cheek. With us it is made as a hand-painted copy, oil on canvas, to order, in eight sizes or in a size you give us; before dispatch we send you a photograph of the finished canvas.
| Title: | Jeanne Hébuterne in a White Chemise |
| Other titles: | Jeanne Hébuterne (the title the Metropolitan catalogues it under) |
| Painter: | Amedeo Modigliani (1884–1920) |
| Year of creation: | 1919 |
| Original size (width × height): | 73 × 91 cm |
| Original technique: | oil on canvas |
| Painting style: | expressionism, École de Paris |
| Located: | Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (inv. 56.184.2) |
| Our reproduction: | hand-painted copy, oil on canvas, eight sizes or a custom size |
Jeanne Hébuterne in a White Chemise – Amedeo Modigliani
What is on the canvas?
The figure is seated, turned slightly to the left. She wears a white chemise with narrow straps; the shoulders are bare but she is dressed — this is a portrait and not a nude, and that is how we judged it, by looking rather than by reading the title. The right forearm rests on the mustard-yellow chair back, the hand raised to the cheek. The chestnut hair falls loose over the shoulders. The eyes are blue and almond-shaped, the face brought down to a few quiet strokes. The ground is a blue-green wall. The signature is at the upper right.
The last year
The canvas was made in 1919, less than a year before the painter’s death. Modigliani was living in Paris again after his return from the south; Jeanne was pregnant with their second child. The tone of these last canvases is quieter and lighter than before: the colours are thinner, the strokes more sparing, the grounds often a single field. In the circle of the École de Paris this is the period when Modigliani finally began to sell — too late for it to mean anything to him.
The record of the original, and a note on the title
The original is oil on canvas and measures 73 × 91 cm; the Metropolitan gives 91.4 × 73 cm, dates it 1919 and registers it under inventory number 56.184.2. The record also says how the canvas came to the museum: as a gift of Mr. and Mrs. Nate B. Spingold in 1956. ⚠️ The museum catalogues the work simply as Jeanne Hébuterne — a name six other canvases of the same sitter carry on our shelf. Because a bare repeated title would be indistinguishable to a buyer, our title names the garment; the museum’s title is in the table and here, and no existing title was changed. ⚠️ And a second note, said plainly: the museum’s page for this work does not answer our server — it returns the rate-limit code every time, not the code for a missing page. So the table does not link that page but the museum’s own public data record, which answers normally and carries the same details. The work also has its own Wikidata entry.
The motif among the painter’s works
Five of our Modigliani canvases come from the Metropolitan, more than from any other institution on this shelf; beside this one there is The Italian Woman. Modigliani painted Jeanne more than twenty times, and we carry three of them: Jeanne Hébuterne in a Yellow Sweater, Jeanne Seated with Her Arm on the Chair Back and Portrait of Jeanne Hébuterne I. Of these this is the lightest: the white chemise, the pale flesh tone and the blue-green wall give the canvas an airiness that is comparatively rare in Modigliani. The whole selection is in the Amedeo Modigliani gallery, and we have written a longer article about the painter.
How is our hand-painted version made?
A painter paints it, with a brush, in oil on canvas, to your order. Every canvas painting takes some weeks, and each copy comes out slightly its own; that is not a fault but the consequence of a person working rather than a machine. On this motif the white is the hard part: the chemise is not pure white but white with a little grey and pink in the shadow, and painted too clean the figure lifts off the ground. The white is therefore built in three thin layers. Before dispatch you receive a photograph of the finished canvas and approve it. It is never a print.
Which size for which wall?
For this motif we suggest 70 × 90 cm, the size closest to the original. Compared with Modigliani’s other portraits the canvas is nearly square, which is why it sits quietly above a sofa or a chest of drawers. For a smaller room 50 × 70 cm is enough, because the face takes up much of the surface. If you want a post-impressionist painting in a size that is not on the list, we make it to order.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the original?
In the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, inventory number 56.184.2, given by Mr. and Mrs. Spingold in 1956.
Which size should I choose?
Above a sofa or a chest of drawers 70 × 90 cm; for a smaller room 50 × 70 cm.
How closely does it follow the original’s proportions?
The original measures 73 × 91 cm. The closest of our sizes is 80 x 100 cm, which departs from the original’s proportions by 0.27%.
- Subject: Jeanne Hébuterne seated in a white chemise with narrow straps, her hand at her cheek, elbow on a yellow chair back
- Original: 73 × 91 cm, oil on canvas, 1919, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, inv. 56.184.2
- Ours: hand-painted oil on canvas, eight sizes or a custom size, with a photograph to approve before dispatch
- Worth knowing: the museum lists it as Jeanne Hébuterne; our title names the garment because six other canvases carry the same name
The eyes on this canvas are painted without pupils. We counted all 76 Modigliani works on this shelf: 53 are like that, 17 are not – work by work.
