Description
Portrait of Madeleine Bernard – one canvas, two paintings, two inventory numbers
A young woman sits turned slightly to the right, her right hand raised to her neck and cheek. She wears a dark blue buttoned bodice with a narrow belt, and over her shoulders is thrown a yellow coat with red lining that she has not put on; the sleeves hang empty. Her hair is pinned up, and she wears a gold earring. The ground is grey-blue, and a brown vertical band rises on the right. Above her hangs a framed image that the top edge cuts off. At the lower right stands a tiny still life with blue slippers. The work is held by the Museum of Grenoble; it was made in 1888.
On the back there is a second painting
The French national record for this work gives two titles at once: the portrait of Madeleine Bernard on the front and The White River on the back. These are not two canvases but a single one, painted on both faces. That is exactly why the museum carries two inventory numbers for it, MG 2190 and MG 2191, as though it were two works. A buyer here receives the front, of course, but the detail explains why the same canvas appears twice in the registers.
The coat she has not put on
The yellow coat is the largest light surface on the canvas and at the same time its most unusual detail: it lies across the shoulders but is not worn. The sleeves stay empty and hang at her sides, the red lining opening like an interior. This makes the figure look caught in the middle of something – neither dressed nor undressed, but halted between the two.
The hand at the neck
All the quiet of the portrait is gathered into one gesture. The raised right hand touches the neck with its palm just below the ear, and the head tilts slightly towards it. Nothing else moves. That is why the sitter’s gaze, directed past us and a little downward, reads as thoughtful rather than absent.
How a hand-painted reproduction is made
Every reproduction here is hand-painted in oil on canvas, stroke by stroke. In this motif the yellow coat is the hardest part: if it goes too light it takes over from the face, and the portrait turns into a still life of cloth. Before dispatch you receive a photograph of the finished work for approval.
- Subject: a seated young woman in a blue bodice with a yellow coat over her shoulders.
- Technique: oil on canvas, a grey-blue ground and a warm yellow surface.
- Sizes: portrait format, from 40 x 50 cm to 160 x 200 cm; 72 x 90 cm and 87 x 110 cm are often chosen.
- Of note: there is another painting on the back of the same canvas.
If the same period interests you, see also Breton Girls Dancing, Pont-Aven, The Green Christ and La belle Angèle. The museum record gives the measurement as height by width: 72 x 58 cm.
