''Madame Moitessier'' is a portrait of Marie-Clotilde-Inès Moitessier (née de Foucauld) begun in 1844 and completed in 1856 by

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres ( ; ; 29 August 1780 – 14 January 1867) was a French Neoclassicism, Neoclassical Painting, painter. Ingres was profoundly influenced by past artistic traditions and aspired to become the guardian of academic ...

. The portrait, which depicts Madame Moitessier seated, is now in the collection of the

National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of more than 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current di ...

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, which acquired it in 1946. ''Madame Moitessier'' is also the title of a second portrait by Ingres, which depicts her standing; it was painted in 1851 and is now in the collection of the

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art is an art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of charge, the museum was privately established in ...

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

Subject

Marie-Clotilde-Inès de Foucauld (1821–1897) was the daughter of a French civil servant in the department of forests and waterways.Tinterow; Conisbee et al, 426 In 1842 she married a widower twice her age, the rich banker and lace merchant Sigisbert Moitessier, thus becoming Madame Moitessier. In 1844 Ingres was approached by his longtime friend and former painting subject Charles Marcotte, who was one of Sigisbert Moitessier's colleagues, with the idea of painting Madame Moitessier's portrait. Reluctant at this stage in his career to accept portrait commissions—he considered portraiture to be a lower form of art than

history painting History painting is a genre in painting defined by its subject matter rather than any artistic style or specific period. History paintings depict a moment in a narrative story, most often (but not exclusively) Greek and Roman mythology and B ...

—he initially refused Marcotte's request. However, when Ingres met Madame Moitessier, he was struck by her beauty and agreed to produce a portrait. Art critic

Théophile Gautier Pierre Jules Théophile Gautier ( , ; 30 August 1811 – 23 October 1872) was a French poet, dramatist, novelist, journalist, and art and literary critic. While an ardent defender of Romanticism, Gautier's work is difficult to classify and rema ...

, who watched during some of the painting sessions, agreed with Ingres, describing her beauty as the most regal, magnificent, stately and Junoesque that he had ever seen drawn.

Two portraits

He began work on the seated version, depicting the subject in a floral dress. Work on the commission proceeded slowly. The painting was originally to include the Moitessiers' daughter, Catherine; Ingres, finding little Catherine "impossible", eliminated her from the composition sometime around 1847. Work on the painting was suspended in 1849, when the death in June of Ingres' wife left him unable to work for several months, and Madame Moitessier was distracted by her second pregnancy and the death of her father. In June 1851, having been reminded by the woman he called "la belle et bonne" ("the beautiful and good") that her portrait had still not been completed, Ingres began afresh, painting the standing portrait of her in a dark dress, which he finished in December 1851. He then returned to the seated portrait, which he completed in 1856, twelve years after he started it. Characteristically, Ingres found inspiration in the art of the past when painting ''Madame Moitessier''. The pose with a hand touching the cheek was taken from a fresco of

Hercules Hercules (, ) is the Roman equivalent of the Greek divine hero Heracles, son of Jupiter and the mortal Alcmena. In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and for his numerous far-ranging adventures. The Romans adapted the Gr ...

and

Telephus In Greek mythology, Telephus (; , ''Tēlephos'', "far-shining") was the son of Heracles and Auge, who was the daughter of king Aleus of Tegea. He was adopted by Teuthras, the king of Mysia, in Asia Minor, whom he succeeded as king. Telephus was ...

from

Herculaneum Herculaneum is an ancient Rome, ancient Roman town located in the modern-day ''comune'' of Ercolano, Campania, Italy. Herculaneum was buried under a massive pyroclastic flow in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. Like the nearby city of ...

that he may have seen in Naples in 1814, and which was familiar to him through

engraving Engraving is the practice of incising a design on a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ar ...

s. According to the National Gallery,

Titian Tiziano Vecellio (; 27 August 1576), Latinized as Titianus, hence known in English as Titian ( ), was an Italian Renaissance painter, the most important artist of Renaissance Venetian painting. He was born in Pieve di Cadore, near Belluno. Ti ...

's '' La Schiavona'', also in the gallery, may have inspired the second profile view in the mirror. She is wearing a dress of fashionable and expensive Lyon silk printed with a floral pattern, which is echoed by the flowers and leaves of the gilt frame. A similar frame was used for Ingres's 1853 portrait of '' The Princesse de Broglie''. File:Arcadia, ercolano.jpg, Fresco of

and

from

, 1st century BC File:Titian - Portrait of a Lady ('La Schiavona') - Google Art Project.jpg, Titian, '' La Schiavona'', 1510–12 File:Jean-auguste-dominique ingres, madame moitessier, 1856, 01.jpg, Madame Moitessier in context: The heavily decorated frame echoes the floral pattern of the sitter's dress Numerous drawn studies for both portraits exist. A study on canvas for the seated portrait, in which the figure has been drawn by Ingres and the background painted by an assistant, is in the Musée Ingres in

Montauban Montauban (, ; ) is a commune in the southern French department of Tarn-et-Garonne. It is the capital of the department and lies north of Toulouse. Montauban is the most populated town in Tarn-et-Garonne, and the sixth most populated of Oc ...

Legacy

Pablo Picasso Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, Ceramic art, ceramicist, and Scenic ...

first encountered the painting at an exhibition in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, in 1921. Over the next decade, he repeatedly referenced Ingres in his art, particularly in his homage in the painting ''Woman with a Book''. The model for ''Woman with a Book'', Picasso's then young mistress,

Marie-Thérèse Walter Marie-Thérèse Walter (13 July 1909 – 20 October 1977) was a French model and lover of Pablo Picasso, with whom she had a daughter, Maya Widmaier-Picasso. Walter is known as Picasso's "golden muse." She inspired numerous artworks and sculpt ...

, mimics Madame Moitessier’s pose. The painting was completed in August 1932. The painting is currently held by the

Norton Simon Museum The Norton Simon Museum is an art museum located in Pasadena, California. It was previously known as the Pasadena Art Institute and the Pasadena Art Museum and displays numerous sculptures on its grounds. Overview The Norton Simon collections ...

, in

Pasadena Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial d ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. The two paintings were exhibited together for the first time at a temporary exhibition organised in partnership with the

, held at the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

in 2022.

Notes

References

* Ribeiro, Aileen (1999). ''Ingres in Fashion: Representations of Dress and Appearance in Ingres's Images of Women''. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. *Tinterow, Gary; Conisbee, Philip; Naef, Hans (1999). ''Portraits by Ingres: Image of an Epoch''. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

External links