To master the rendering of the human form in conventional poses was a core aim of artistic training in art schools, or academies, which is why the resulting studies are known in French as "académies". This study has been identified as Delacroix's earliest "académie" in oil paint, produced while he was a pupil of the history painter Pierre Narcisse Guérin. Delacroix was less interested in the contour of the figure than in conveying an impression of physical presence through the rendering of human flesh.
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Credit Line:Promised Gift from the Karen B. Cohen Collection of Eugène Delacroix, in memory of Arthur G. Cohen
Accession Number:L.2018.45.61
The artist's estate sale, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, February, 17-29, 1864, part of lot 200; possibly Etienne Joseph Théophile Thoré(from 1864); possibly Henri Vever; [A. Vullier, Paris, until 1897; sold in February to Mercier]; Monsieur Mercier, Lausanne (from February 1897); by descent to H.E. Lombardet, Lausanne (until 1966; his sale, Lausanne, February 3, 1966); Constantin A. Sfezzo (Swiss), Lausanne(until 1987; sale, Christie's, London, Nov. 27, 1987, lot 51, to London dealer); [London art market, 1987-88; sold to Cohen]; Karen B. Cohen, New York (from 1988)
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863): Paintings, Drawings, and Prints from North American Collections," April 10–June 16, 1991.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Romanticism and the School of Nature: Nineteenth-Century Drawings and Paintings from the Karen B. Cohen Collection," October 17, 2000–January 21, 2001.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Delacroix," September 17, 2018–January 6, 2019.
Felix Baumann, Hugo Wagner, Kunstmuseum Bern Eugène Delacroix. Bern, 1963, cat. no. 1.
Lee Johnson The Paintings of Eugène Delacroix: A Critical Catalogue. Clarendon Press, 1, Oxford, 1981, cat. no. 1, fig. no. 1, p. 3, ill.
Lee Johnson The Paintings of Eugène Delacroix: A Critical Catalogue. Clarendon Press, 2, Oxford, 1981, fig. no. 1, ill.
Lee Johnson The Paintings of Eugene Delacroix: A Critical Catalogue: Volumes 5-6: The Public Decorations and their Sketches; Supplements and Plates. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1989, cat. no. 1, p. 193.
Jacob Bean, Lee Johnson, William M. Griswold Eugène Delacroix (1798-1863): Paintings, Drawings, and Prints from North American Collections. Ex. cat. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1991, cat. no. 1, p. 64, ill.
Colta Ives, Elizabeth E. Barker Romanticism and the School of Nature : Nineteenth-Century Drawings and Paintings from the Karen B. Cohen Collection. Exh. cat.: October 17 - January 21, 2001. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Yale University Press, New York, 2000, cat. no. 28, pp. 58-59, ill.
Christophe Leribault Une passion pour Delacroix: la collection Karen B. Cohen. Paris, 2009, cat. no. 83, p. 117, ill.
The Met's collection of drawings and prints—one of the most comprehensive and distinguished of its kind in the world—began with a gift of 670 works from Cornelius Vanderbilt, a Museum trustee, in 1880.
