{"id":212901,"date":"2026-08-28T20:33:25","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T18:33:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/svetslik.si\/nekategorizirano\/portrait-of-beatrice-hastings-barnes-2\/"},"modified":"2026-09-10T14:44:02","modified_gmt":"2026-09-10T12:44:02","slug":"portrait-of-beatrice-hastings-barnes","status":"publish","type":"product","link":"https:\/\/svetslik.si\/en\/amedeo-modigliani\/portrait-of-beatrice-hastings-barnes\/","title":{"rendered":"Amedeo Modigliani \u2013 Beatrice (Portrait of B\u00e9atrice Hastings)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Beatrice (Portrait of B\u00e9atrice Hastings) is a canvas of 1916 in the Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, under the number BF361. The sitter is seen close to under a black hat, her eyes almost shut, and her name runs across the top of the picture in painted capitals. 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
Title:<\/td>\nBeatrice (Portrait of B\u00e9atrice Hastings)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Other titles:<\/td>\nBeatrice (Portrait de B\u00e9atrice Hastings), the museum\u2019s own form; the catalogues also list Au th\u00e9\u00e2tre<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Painter:<\/td>\nAmedeo Modigliani (1884\u20131920)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Year of creation:<\/td>\n1916 \u2014 the museum\u2019s year, and the painter dated the canvas himself<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Original size (width \u00d7 height):<\/td>\n38.2 \u00d7 55 cm \u2014 the museum\u2019s overall figures; an older catalogue gave 33 \u00d7 55 cm<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Original technique:<\/td>\noil on canvas with newsprint \u2014 the museum\u2019s own wording, not oil alone<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Painting style:<\/td>\nexpressionism, \u00c9cole de Paris<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Located:<\/td>\nBarnes Foundation, Philadelphia<\/a> (inv. BF361, bought by Albert C. Barnes in 1925)<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Our reproduction:<\/td>\nhand-painted copy, oil on canvas, eight sizes or a custom size<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Beatrice (Portrait of B\u00e9atrice Hastings) \u2013 Amedeo Modigliani<\/h2>\n

What is on the canvas?<\/h3>\n

The head and shoulders fill the picture, the head turned to her left and tilted, the eyes almost shut \u2014 one shows a dark iris under a heavy lid, the other is reduced to the lid\u2019s line. A large black hat sits low over the brow, and a pale grey plume curls out of it at the left. The face is pink and ochre, broad at the cheek and narrowing to a small red-brown mouth; the nose is one unbroken line from the brow. Down the right side of the face runs a hard black slab of shadow \u2014 not modelled but cut, a flat block laid against the cheek. She wears a heavy olive-brown coat with a wide collar crossing at the front and one large dark button at the lower right. The ground is built from panels: a striped grey-brown one at the left, a rust-orange field at the right, and above them a pale panel that carries the printed texture of newspaper. Across the top, in large painted capitals, runs her name \u2014 the hat cuts into it, so what reads clearly is ATRICE. The signature is at the lower centre, and the catalogue file records it as Modigliani with the year beneath.<\/p>\n

Why is there newspaper in the picture?<\/h3>\n

Because there was a piece of it stuck to the surface. The museum\u2019s own record says so: at one time a strip of newspaper was pasted to the canvas, and traces of the newsprint ink remain visible in the background, just below her name. That is why the medium field reads oil on canvas with newsprint rather than oil on canvas, and it is why the pale panel at the upper right looks like printed matter under the paint \u2014 we can see it in the photograph, and the museum\u2019s note explains what we are seeing. The museum reads the picture as an experiment with cubism, the sitter translated into sharp blocky forms; that is its description and we hand it on as its description, with the note that the museum\u2019s own record marks this text as not yet curatorially approved. The strip is gone; the ink stayed. For the same trick of writing a name into a picture, see Lola de Valence<\/a>, where the head cuts the lettering off in the same way.<\/p>\n

The record of the original, and who the sitter was<\/h3>\n

The original is oil on canvas with newsprint, and the museum gives its overall size as 55 cm high and 38.2 cm wide; we give width first, so on our page it reads 38.2 \u00d7 55 cm. An older catalogue recorded 33 cm across rather than 38.2, and the modern catalogue file agrees with the museum, so we follow the museum. The number is BF361 and the year is 1916, which the painter also wrote on the canvas himself. B\u00e9atrice Hastings was a British poet and journalist who came to Paris in 1914 and wrote from Montparnasse under a pen name; she and Modigliani were together, stormily, for about two years, and he painted her more than once. The other portrait is on this shelf as Portrait of Beatrice Hastings<\/a>. The work also has its own Wikidata entry<\/a>. The whole selection is in the Amedeo Modigliani gallery<\/a>, and we have written a longer article<\/a> about the painter.<\/p>\n

Where has the picture been?<\/h3>\n

This is the shortest and firmest provenance on the shelf so far, because the museum publishes it in one line of its own: purchased by Albert C. Barnes from Paul Guillaume, Paris, in January 1925. Two names, one date, and the institution itself standing behind them. Paul Guillaume was the Paris dealer who handled a great deal of Modigliani, and he is on this shelf too, painted by him, as Paul Guillaume<\/a>. Nothing is published about the nine years between the painting and that sale, and we do not fill them in. It is worth saying how unusual this is: most of the works on this shelf come with a chain of collectors that some catalogue has marked as unfinished, and this one comes with a receipt. Guillaume was the dealer the \u00c9cole de Paris ran through, which is why his name keeps appearing on this shelf.<\/p>\n

How is our hand-painted version made?<\/h3>\n

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 the consequence of a person working rather than a machine. Two things decide whether this one comes off. The first is the black slab beside the face: it has to stay a flat shape with a hard edge, because the moment it is softened into shadow the picture stops being the experiment it is and becomes an ordinary portrait. The second is the lettering, which must be painted with the same brush as the rest and must keep its interruption where the hat crosses it. The pale panel behind is painted as a worked, printed-looking surface rather than a clean wall, since that is what the original carries. We do not paste newspaper onto the copy; it is painted throughout, and we say so rather than implying a collage. Before dispatch you receive a photograph of the finished canvas and approve it. It is never a print.<\/p>\n

Which size for which wall?<\/h3>\n

For this motif we suggest 70 \u00d7 100 cm. On proportions we measured the ladder: 90 \u00d7 130 cm is nearest at 0.3 per cent from the original\u2019s shape, and 70 \u00d7 100 cm follows at 0.8 per cent, with 120 \u00d7 170 cm third at 1.6 per cent. The picture is built out of flat panels of colour, so it reads from a distance better than a modelled portrait does and it takes enlargement well; at 90 \u00d7 130 cm it holds a main wall without becoming a poster. The palette is olive, rust and black, which wants a light wall \u2014 on a dark one the coat and the hat close up and only the face is left. A post-impressionist painting in a size that is not on the list is no trouble: we make it to order<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Frequently asked questions<\/h3>\n

Where is the original?<\/h4>\n

In the Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, inventory number BF361, bought by Albert C. Barnes from Paul Guillaume in January 1925.<\/p>\n

Is there really newspaper on the original?<\/h4>\n

There was. The museum records that a strip of newspaper was once pasted to the surface and that traces of its ink remain in the background. Our copy is painted, not pasted.<\/p>\n

Who was B\u00e9atrice Hastings?<\/h4>\n

A British poet and journalist who came to Paris in 1914. She and Modigliani were together for about two years, and he painted her more than once.<\/p>\n

How closely does it follow the original\u2019s proportions?<\/h4>\n

The original measures 38.2 \u00d7 55 cm. The closest of our sizes is 90 x 130 cm, which departs from the original\u2019s proportions by 0.32%. The catalogues do not agree on the size and give 38.2 \u00d7 55 cm; 33 \u00d7 55 cm; the comparison above starts from the first of them.<\/p>\n