Woman Seated on a Red-Flowered Sofa
Date1882
Maker
Gustave Caillebotte
French, 1848-1894
Label TextThe subject of this portrait has not been identified. Her clothes are smartly conservative—she might be a family friend or even a housekeeper in the artist’s employ. Caillebotte’s composition emphasizes the woman’s formal, slightly anxious disposition by compressing her head beneath a heavy picture frame and surrounding her body in the rich tones of a parlor.
Caillebotte exhibited with the French Impressionists and was an important early collector of his friends’ paintings. He is best known for dramatically sparse compositions depicting modern city life.
Object number91.12
Photo CreditPhoto: Paul Macapia
Exhibition HistoryParis, France, Galerie des Beaux-Arts, Gustave Caillebotte (1848-1894), 1951, no. 153.
Paris, France, Caillebotte, "Reunion des Musees Nationaux", Musee d'Orsay, September 13, 1994 - January 9, 1995; Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, February 15 - May 28, 1995, no. 76. (09/13/1994 - 05/28/1995)
Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, "Five Installations on the Fourth Floor: Aspects of Late-Nineteenth-Century Art", June 26, 1997 - January 24, 1999.
Portland, Oregon, Portland Art Museum, "Essay on Impressionism", September 18, 1998 - May 1, 1999 (09/18/1998 - 05/01/1999)
Baltimore, Maryland, Baltimore Museum of Art, "Impressionism: paintings Collected by European museums", October 6, 1999 - July 30, 2000
Italy, Fondazione Cassamarca, "L'Impressionismo e l'eta di Van Gogh: La rivoluzione di un 'arte nuova", November 2002 - April 2003
Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, "French Painting from SAM's Permanent Collection", April 23, 2005 - January 2, 2006
Tacoma, Washington, Tacoma Art Museum, Monet, Renoir, Degas, and Their Circle: French Impressionism and the Northwest, Sept. 28, 2019-Jan. 24, 2020.Published ReferencesSagner, Karin, "Gustave Caillebotte, Neue Perspektiven des Impressionismus." 2009;
p. 132.
Morton, Mary, et al. "Gustave Caillebotte: The Painter's Eye." Exh. Cat. Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 2015; pp. 95-96, reproduced fig. 7 [not in exhibition].
Marrinan, Michael, Gustavr Caillebotte.Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2016; p. 265, reproduced fig. 126.Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. Prentice Bloedel
Dimensions31 x 35 in. (78.74 x 88.9 cm)
Framed: 42 x 46 in.
MediumOil on canvas
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