The Nude Model
Drawing executed in charcoal and white chalk on blue paper, representing a naked woman standing three-quarters back. Cloth on her left arm suggests that our model is or getting undress, or at the contrary that she is getting dressed.
This work demonstrates the technical mastery of the artist that skillfully plays with chiaroscuro. The modeling of the body, made with the classic combination of charcoal and chalk heightened with white, is further enhanced by the dark blue paper. This graphical technique that wraps the body of a lunar light, is evocative of the drawings of Pierre-Paul Prud’hon. The model meanwhile, with round and solid shapes, immediately evokes the Rubenian female body. The admiration Louis Anquetin dedicated to Flemish master here is very noticeable.
The sheet is signed lower left.
Circa: 1895-1905
Dimensions :
Height : 24 in. Length : 18 1/2 in.
Framed: Height : 35 in. Length : 30 in.
Remarks :
Louis Anquetin, painter born in Etrépagny in l’Eure on January 26, 1861, had a very promising career beginning and was considered by 1880-90’s avant-guarde critics as one of the hopes of modern French art. His role in the birth of cloissonism is crucial: with Emile Bernard, his faithful friend, they began indeed to developed a very innovative style of painting which opened a new way, an alternative to impressionism, facing divisionism that they considered as a dead end. However, in 1893, convinced that his comrades and himself engaged in a dead end path that would lead to the bankruptcy of art, Louis Anquetin adopted a stance radically opposed to his initial research. He decided to revive the tradition and the basic principles of classical art. Advocating the ‘Return to work’, he will devote himself to the study of the great masters and dedicate to the art of Rubens a boundless admiration. The artist then looked at the drawing as the essence of all artistic practice, the pictorial means of expression by excellence.
