Description
Amedeo Modigliani – Renée (1917), a hand-painted oil reproduction of the portrait
Renée is a portrait of 1917 held by the São Paulo Museum of Art. Modigliani painted the sitter at bust length, with a mass of reddish-auburn hair framing the face and a thin gold chain at the throat. We make it as a hand-painted oil on canvas, to order; among our reproductions on canvas this is one of the Modigliani portraits that sits most quietly on a wall.
What is on the canvas
The woman is shown to the bust. The hair is full and reddish-chestnut, worn loose and closing around the face on both sides. The forehead is high and rounded, the brows arched, the eyes almond-shaped and grey-green. A pink flush sits high on both cheeks and the mouth is small and red. The neck is long and slender, lengthened in Modigliani’s way. The dress is a deep oxblood red with a rounded neckline, and a thin gold chain with a small pendant hangs at the throat. The ground is dark brown-maroon, crossed behind the shoulders by a lighter horizontal band. The signature is lower right.
The year 1917
The portrait dates from 1917, Modigliani’s most concentrated year. He was working under the dealer Léopold Zborowski, who found him models and paid for a studio, and in that single year he produced the run of portraits he is known for today. A sitter called Renée appears on a small number of canvases of the same period. Exactly who she was has not been settled; the museum record gives only the name, so we write no more than is known.
The record of the original
The original is oil on canvas and measures 38 x 61 cm; it is held by the São Paulo Museum of Art under inventory number MASP.00149. The year 1917 is recorded to year precision, so we print it. The measurements were read together with their unit rather than as bare numbers – in records of this kind the unit is part of the fact, not a detail. The proportions of our own file agree with the record to within 1.4 per cent, which confirms it.
What you receive
The painting is made for you by hand, oil on canvas, to order, in the size you choose, including custom sizes. This motif carries both a small and a large format: the face is built from soft transitions and the ground is nearly a single colour, so the picture stays calm even at scale. The work takes some weeks and every copy differs slightly; that is the consequence of a person painting it, not a defect. Like all our reproductions of famous paintings it is worked from the record and not from a screen grab. We send you a photograph of the finished canvas before it ships. Our 3D application lets you choose a frame and renders that frame realistically on screen; separately, our visualization service places the picture on your own wall before you buy. It is never a print.
| Year of creation: | 1917 |
| Original size (width × height): | 38 x 61 cm |
| Painting style: | Expressionism |
| Original technique: | Oil on canvas |
| Located: | São Paulo Museum of Art (MASP), inv. MASP.00149 |
Renée is one of those portraits in which Modigliani tells you nothing about the sitter’s trade or standing – what is left is a face, the hair, and the colour of a dress. That is exactly why it settles so easily into a living room or a bedroom.
