Inscription: Signed (lower right): G. Rouault; signed (verso, lower right): G. Rouault
[possibly Galerie Druet, Paris, in 1926; sold to Feuz]; Werner Feuz, Bern and Zürich (possibly in 1938; sold to Mouradian-Vallotton); [Galerie Mouradian-Vallotton, Paris, until 1949; sold in 1949 to Hillman]; Mr. and Mrs. Alex L. Hillman, New York (1949; their gift to MMA)
Kunsthalle Basel. "Vlaminck, R. Dufy, Rouault," May 14–June 8, 1938, no. 142 (as "Filles," 1908, lent by a private collection, Zürich) [possibly this picture].
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Modern Paintings—Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries," July 8–September 6, 1950, no catalogue.
Hempstead, N. Y. Hofstra College. "Metropolitan Museum Masterpieces," June 26–September 1, 1952, brochure no. 42.
Westport, Conn. Leonid Kipnis Gallery. "Works of Georges Rouault," May 14–27, 1955, no. 16.
New York. Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. "Exhibition of Contemporary Religious Art," November 18, 1976–January 2, 1977, unnumbered cat.
Musée d'Art Moderne et Contemporain, Musées de Strasbourg. "Georges Rouault. Forme, couleur, harmonie," November 10, 2006–March 18, 2007, no. 9 (as "Filles [Deux nus]").
Mitchell-Innes & Nash, New York. "Georges Rouault: Judges, Clowns, and Whores," May 2–June 9, 2007, no. 5 (as "Filles").
Chestnut Hill, Mass. McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College. "Mystic Masque: Semblance and Reality in Georges Rouault, 1871–1958," August 30–December 7, 2008, no. 7a-b (as "Filles [Whores (double-sided)]").
Georges Charensol. Georges Rouault: L'Homme et l'oeuvre. Paris, 1926, pl. 15 (recto), calls it "Fille," watercolor, and dates it 1908.
[Giorgio Nicodemi]. Rouault. Milan, 1945, pl. 15 (recto), calls it "Nudi" and dates it 1908.
Emily Genauer. "Art and Artists: Unfettered Art Has Taken Over the Metropolitan's Gallery B 17." New York Herald Tribune (August 13, 1950), p. D5.
Charles Sterling and Margaretta M. Salinger. French Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 3, XIX–XX Centuries. New York, 1967, pp. 219–20, ill. (recto and verso), call it "Two Nudes (Filles)"; note that the artist considered the recto and verso of this work to be sketches.
Gary Tinterow et al. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Vol. 8, Modern Europe. New York, 1987, pp. 101, colorpl. 76 (recto), comment that Rouault often depicted prostitutes, as in this picture, to convey his devout Christianity through images of social vices.
Bernard Dorival and Isabelle Rouault. Rouault, l'œuvre peint. Monte-Carlo, 1988, vol. 1, pp. 63, 109–10, no. 174, ill. (recto), call it "Filles," date it 1906–8, and classify it as a watercolor.
David Nash. Georges Rouault: Judges, Clowns and Whores. Exh. cat., Mitchell-Innes & Nash. New York, 2007, p. 51, no. 5, colorpl. 1 (recto), ill. p. 51 (color, recto and verso), dates it 1906–8.
Stephen Schloesser inMystic Masque: Semblance and Reality in Georges Rouault, 1871–1958. Ed. Stephen Schloesser. Exh. cat., McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College. Chestnut Hill, Mass., 2008, pp. 88, 92, no. 7a–b, ill. p. 467 (color, recto and verso), compares this work to "Christ Mocked" (1905, Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Va.), noting similarities in date, medium, and dimensions to conclude that both "are meant to be identified with one another, two manifestations of a single mechanism—both are masked figures performing a masque as they entertain others. The masks of both are mis-judged".
Claude Cernuschi. "Georges Rouault and the Rhetoric of Expressionism." Religion and the Arts 12, no. 4 (2008), p. 494, fig. 2 (color, recto).
Jennifer Johnson. Georges Rouault and Material Imagining. London, 2020, pp. 122–23, fig. 4.2 (color), colorpl. 13.
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