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Day 13

Amedeo Modigliani

Amedeo Modigliani · Amedeo Clemente Modigliani

The tragic portraitist of the École de Paris, who painted the soul through elongated necks and empty almond eyes, and died at just 35.

Life 1884-1920Nationality Italian (born in Livorno, active in Paris)Movement École de Paris / modern portraiture and Expressionism
Amedeo Modigliani, Young Man with a Cap (Portrait of a Young Man with a Hat), 1919, oil on canvas, 61 × 37.8 cm, Detroit Institute of Arts (Bequest of Robert Hudson Tannahill, acc. 70.185). Confirmed as the Modigliani entry in this touring exhibition.
· Amedeo Modigliani, Young Man with a Cap (Portrait of a Young Man with a Hat), 1919, oil on canvas, 61 × 37.8 cm, Detroit Institute of Arts (Bequest of Robert Hudson Tannahill, acc. 70.185). Confirmed as the Modigliani entry in this touring exhibition.
1919 · Detroit Institute of Arts · Sources

Life

Amedeo Clemente Modigliani was born on July 12, 1884, the youngest child of a Sephardic Jewish family in Livorno, Italy. The household was on the brink of bankruptcy the very day he was born, and the story goes that the family exploited an Italian law stating that 'a debtor's bed and the belongings upon it cannot be seized,' piling their most valuable possessions in a heap atop the bed of the new mother (Eugénie Garsin). His intellectual mother actively nurtured the artistic gifts of her sickly son, who suffered pleurisy at 11, typhoid, and tuberculosis at 16. After studying painting under Guglielmo Micheli in Livorno, he absorbed the tradition of the Italian masters at the Florence Academy of Fine Arts (1902) and in Venice (1903).

In 1906, at the age of 22, he moved to Paris, settling first in Montmartre and later joining the bohemian artists' community of Montparnasse. He was influenced by Toulouse-Lautrec, Cézanne, and Picasso, and was especially drawn to African sculpture and the counsel of Constantin Brâncuși. Around 1909-1914 he concentrated on sculpture (elongated heads and caryatids) rather than painting, even exhibiting sculptures at the 1912 Salon d'Automne. But the stone dust aggravated his tuberculosis, and with the cost of materials and the outbreak of the First World War, he gave up sculpture and returned to painting.

After a turbulent relationship with the English poet Beatrice Hastings (1914-1916), he met the young art student Jeanne Hébuterne in the spring of 1917 and made her the love of his life and his muse. That December, the Berthe Weill gallery held the only solo exhibition of his lifetime, but the police descended on opening day, declaring the nudes in the window obscene and effectively shutting it down. The Polish poet turned art dealer Léopold Zborowski supported him by providing a studio, models, materials, and a daily wage, yet poverty, alcohol, and hashish wore away his frail body. It is said that he deliberately cultivated the image of an alcoholic and drug addict to conceal his contagious tuberculosis. On January 24, 1920, he died of tubercular meningitis at the Charité hospital in Paris, aged 35. The very next day, the 21-year-old Jeanne Hébuterne, nine months pregnant, took her own life by throwing herself from a fifth-floor window of her parents' home. The couple left behind a daughter, Jeanne Modigliani, born in 1918, who would later become an art historian and write her father's biography. He died poor and obscure, but after his death his portraits rose to the ranks of the most expensive paintings in the world.

Style & Innovation

Modigliani's innovation lies in reinventing the most traditional of genres—the portrait—in the language of twentieth-century modernism. Without fully joining either the formal dissolution of Cubism or the chromatic explosion of Fauvism, he fused the elongated elegance of Renaissance Mannerism (Botticelli, Parmigianino) with the simplified abstraction of African and Cycladic masks. The result is the lengthened neck, the tilted head, the narrow shoulders, the mask-like oval face, and the empty, pupil-less almond eyes. These 'empty eyes' are not an absence of sight but a gaze turned inward; he painted not the model's outward appearance but the atmosphere of their being. He is said to have remarked, 'With one eye you look out at the world, with the other you look within yourself.'

His early career as a sculptor is the skeleton that supports his painting. Even on a flat surface he shaped his figures with contour lines, as if carving them out, and emptied the background to a near-monochrome so that the figure rises like a relief. He set himself apart further by painting almost no landscapes and concentrating solely on portraits and nudes, and by choosing as his models not wealthy patrons who commissioned him but the 'nameless ordinary people' around him—dealers, lovers, fellow painters, maids, children. In this exhibition's seven-section narrative, Modigliani is placed in the final Expressionism and École de Paris zone. Having passed through Fauvism (Matisse's color) and Cubism (Picasso's dissolution of form), he remained an individualist absorbed by no single movement, holding fast to the human subject of the 'face' to the very end—an artist who stylized the human figure most poetically just before the leap into abstraction (Kandinsky).

Technique

Standing before a Modigliani canvas, look first at the 'line.' The most living thing on his canvas is not the field of color but the long, fluid contour that flows along the figure's silhouette. The single breath-like curve that runs from neck to shoulder, from the bridge of the nose to the chin, shows that he painted with a sculptor's eye, 'carving' form. The paint layer is generally thin and subdued. Rather than building it up thickly with impasto, he spread earthen tones—ochre, terracotta, olive—and soft apricot flatly across the surface, simplifying the background to one or two colors so the figure rises like a relief. So before the actual work, the key is to study the tremor of the contour line, the places where the brush came to rest, and the subtle color transitions between skin and clothing—rather than the gloss of the surface.

Pay special attention to the eyes. The single-toned, pupil-less almond eyes, seen up close, are often handled subtly differently from one to the other, and by leaving the pupils empty he turns the gaze 'inward.' The unreal length of the neck, the slight tilt of the head, the rhythm of the narrowed shoulder line—stand before them in person and you feel how deliberate and musical the stylization is. In terms of conservation science, X-ray and infrared reflectography of Modigliani's works often reveal another painting hidden beneath a single canvas. Too poor to buy new canvases, he frequently painted over existing pictures (underdrawings and earlier compositions have been reported in works held by several museums). The ground layer showing through the thin paint, the fine craquelure of a picture more than a century old, the weave of the canvas—these are details readable only in the original.

Key Works

Young Man with a Cap (Young Man and Cap · Young Man in a Peaked Cap)
Young Man with a Cap (Portrait of a Young Man with a Hat) · Young Man with a Cap (Young Man and Cap · Young Man in a Peaked Cap)In this showDIA collection
1919 · Oil on canvas · Detroit Institute of Arts, Bequest of Robert Hudson Tannahill (acc. 70.185) · Sources

Why it matters

This is precisely the work the Seoul press referred to as 'Young Man in a Hat.' The catalogue for the Rome Ara Pacis touring exhibition (archeoroma and others) explicitly lists as a Modigliani entry 'Portrait of a Young Man with a Hat (1919), Detroit Institute of Arts, Bequest of Robert Hudson Tannahill, 70.185,' which is the same as the 'Young Man with a Cap' (70.185, Tannahill Bequest) actually held by the DIA. A portrait in which the late style of Modigliani's final years (1919, the year before his death) is fully realized, it is the key work representing him in this exhibition.

👁 What to look for

Look first at the elongated neck, the slightly tilted oval face, and the almond eyes filled in a single tone without pupils. Notice how the rim of the cap's brim flows into one rhythm with the contours of the head and face, and how the near-monochrome background lifts the figure like a relief. Examine the thin, flat paint layer and the fine craquelure up close.

Backstory

After being exhibited in New York in 1931, this work is said to have been purchased in February 1932 from G.J. Demotte of New York by the Detroit collector Robert Hudson Tannahill. An heir to the J.L. Hudson department store fortune and a collector, Tannahill died in 1969, and in 1970 bequeathed to the DIA a collection that included this work (the Tannahill bequest is said to comprise about 557 pieces, valued at roughly 13 million dollars). That bequest decisively strengthened Detroit's modern collection (Cézanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Degas, Seurat, Matisse, Picasso, and more). The title is used interchangeably as 'Young Man with a Cap' (Detroit's official title) and 'Young Man in/with a Hat' (Rome and Seoul press); the difference between 'cap' and 'hat' is one of translation, and it is the same work (the Rome catalogue specifies acc. 70.185, Tannahill Bequest).

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Portrait of a Young Woman
c.1918
View the work →

Portrait of a Young Woman · Portrait of a Young WomanDIA collection
c.1918 · Oil on canvas · Detroit Institute of Arts · Sources

Why it matters

A signature female portrait by Modigliani held by the Detroit Institute of Arts, it entered the museum's collection in 1935 (from the Carlo Foresti collection in Milan, through Julius Weitzner of New York, to the DIA in 1935). Some sources read this painting as an intimate portrait of Jeanne Hébuterne, Modigliani's lover and muse, though accounts differ on the sitter's identity. 1918 was the year he had withdrawn to Nice and Cagnes-sur-Mer to escape the war—the year his portrait style ripened to its most lyrical.

👁 What to look for

If it can be set beside 'Young Man with a Cap' (should both be on display), compare the treatment of the eyes and necks of the two figures, male and female. Note how the woman's tilted head, long neck, and empty eyes are stylized into calm planes, and look for the ground showing through beneath the thin paint.

Backstory

Detroit was a progressive museum—the first American museum to purchase a Van Gogh and a Matisse, in 1922 (during the directorship of Wilhelm Valentiner)—and it collected Modigliani relatively early as well, in the 1930s. This work was in the Milan collection of Carlo Foresti around 1935, and that same year Detroit acquired it through the New York dealer Julius Weitzner, where it remains today.

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A Woman
c.1917-1920
View the work →

A Woman · A WomanDIA collection
c.1917-1920 · Oil on canvas · Detroit Institute of Arts, acc. 26.16 · Sources

Why it matters

Purchased directly by Detroit on February 18, 1926 from the Paris collection of Léopold Zborowski, Modigliani's patron (acc. 26.16), it is an instance of an American museum admitting a Modigliani into its official collection remarkably early—just six years after the artist's death. Coming to Detroit from the hands of the very dealer who witnessed his death, the work carries great value in its provenance.

👁 What to look for

Look for how Modigliani's typical grammar of the female portrait—long neck, tilted head, monochrome background, asymmetrically composed face—is realized here. Whether it is included in this exhibition can be confirmed from the gallery labels and catalogue.

Backstory

This work came out of the Paris collection of Modigliani's patron Léopold Zborowski and was purchased by Detroit on February 18, 1926 (acc. 26.16). Zborowski provided Modigliani with a studio and models (his wife Hanka Zborowska, his friend Lunia Czechowska, and others), and after the artist's death played a major role in spreading his work around the world.

Behind the Canvas

01Treasures on the Bed, the Day He Was Born

On the day Modigliani was born in 1884, the household was on the brink of bankruptcy. The story goes that the family exploited an Italian law stating that 'a debtor's bed and the belongings upon it cannot be seized,' piling their most valuable possessions in a heap atop the new mother's bed. His life was bound up with poverty from its very start.

02The Only Solo Show of His Lifetime, Shut by Police on Opening Day

His one and only solo exhibition, held at the Berthe Weill gallery in December 1917, was effectively closed on opening day when the police descended and ordered the works removed, calling the nude hung in the window obscene. Unrecognized in his lifetime, those very nudes have become his most famous body of work today.

03Why the Eyes Are Empty

Of the empty, pupil-less eyes Modigliani painted, there is a story that when a model asked, 'Why won't you paint my eyes?', he replied, 'When I know your soul, I will paint your eyes.' His 'empty eyes' were not unfinished but a deliberate gaze turned inward.

04The Tuberculosis That Stole His Dream of Sculpture

He had originally wanted to be a sculptor rather than a painter, carving stone himself at Brâncuși's side and even submitting sculptures to the 1912 Salon d'Automne. But when the stone dust worsened his tuberculosis and the war made materials hard to obtain, he gave up sculpture. The sense of that thwarted sculpture survived in the contour lines of his flat paintings.

05Tannahill's Bequest and Detroit's Modigliani

Robert Hudson Tannahill, a collector and heir to the J.L. Hudson department store fortune in Detroit, died in 1969 and in 1970 bequeathed to the DIA about 557 works (valued at roughly 13 million dollars), among them modern masterpieces including 'Young Man with a Cap.' This one man's bequest forms the backbone of Detroit's modern collection today, and the Modigliani in this touring exhibition is one of those works.

06Glory That Came Only After Death

Though he died at 35 in poverty and obscurity, after his death his nude 'Nu couché' (1917) rose to the ranks of the highest-priced works, selling at Christie's in November 2015 for about 170 million dollars (around 170.4 million dollars, hammered to the Chinese collector Liu Yiqian). A painter who could not sell a single picture for a high price in his lifetime saw his work become, within a century, one of the most expensive paintings in the world.

What to check in person

  • Read the line first: the most living thing on a Modigliani canvas is not the field of color but the long, unbroken contour that flows along the figure's silhouette. Let your eye follow the single breath of the curve that runs from neck to shoulder to the bridge of the nose.
  • Look into the eyes: the almond eyes, filled in a single tone without pupils, are sometimes handled subtly differently from left to right when seen up close. Notice how the gaze feels turned not outward but 'inward.'
  • Length of the neck and angle of the head: the unrealistically elongated neck and slightly tilted head are deliberate stylization. View them recalling that they are the fusion of Renaissance Mannerism's elegance with sculptural simplification.
  • Thickness of the paint layer: a subdued surface where earthen and apricot tones are spread thinly and flatly, rather than built up thickly with impasto. Look for the subtle color transitions and the ground showing through, rather than the gloss.
  • Emptiness of the background: the background is simplified to one or two colors to make the figure rise like a relief. Observe how the contour line 'carves' form at the edge where figure meets background.
  • The time on the surface: in places the fine craquelure and the weave of the canvas emerge through the thin paint layer. Look up close at the physical traces left by a picture more than a century old.
  • With a sculptor's eye: remember that he began in sculpture, and feel whether the figure on the flat surface looks like a relief carved out of stone.
  • The geometry of cap and brim: in 'Young Man with a Cap,' savor the geometric harmony the cap's round, simple rim forms with the oval of the face and the vertical of the neck.

Connections

In this exhibition's final Expressionism and École de Paris section, Modigliani is placed alongside Beckmann and Kokoschka, and just before Kandinsky, who crosses over into abstraction. In Paris he associated with Picasso (this exhibition's representative of Cubism), and in absorbing both Cézanne's sense of structural form and the simplification of African sculpture he serves as a bridge linking Post-Impressionism (Cézanne) to Primitivism and Cubism. In sculpture he was directly influenced by Brâncuși. Yet, joining fully neither in Fauvism's liberation of color (Matisse) nor in Cubism's dissolution of form (Picasso), he was an individualist who held to the theme of 'the face and the human being' to the end, becoming the symbol of an École de Paris that belonged to no single movement. The Detroit Institute of Arts' modern collection was greatly strengthened by Robert Hudson Tannahill's 1970 bequest of about 557 works, and this exhibition's Modigliani entry (Young Man with a Cap, 1919) is part of that very Tannahill bequest.

Did You Know

He studied Cycladic and African masks, bringing their elongated faces and mask-like simplification into his painting.
He painted almost no landscapes, concentrating his whole life on just two genres—portraits and nudes.
He mainly painted the ordinary people around him—dealers, lovers, fellow painters, maids, children—rather than the wealthy patrons who commissioned him.
Wanting to become a sculptor, he for a time nearly abandoned painting to devote himself to stone heads and caryatids.
One interpretation holds that he deliberately cultivated the image of an alcoholic and drug addict to conceal his contagious tuberculosis.
The Detroit Institute of Arts holds several Modigliani paintings (Young Man with a Cap, Portrait of a Young Woman, A Woman, A Man, and others).
⚖ Notes still to verify
  • The model in 'Portrait of a Young Woman' is Jeanne Hébuterne — low: Some sources introduce it as 'a portrait of the artist's lover Jeanne Hébuterne,' but the DIA's official description does not firmly establish the sitter's identity, and accounts differ accordingly. The fact that Jeanne and Modigliani met in 1917 is consistent with the c.1918 dating.
  • Earlier paintings are found beneath Modigliani's canvases through X-ray and infrared imaging — medium: This is a general fact: canvas reuse and underdrawings have been reported in Modigliani works held by several museums. However, specific examination results for the individual Detroit works are not confirmed in published materials, and the details can be confirmed in the museum's official conservation records.
  • The exact dimensions and accession numbers of the DIA Modigliani works — medium: Published DIA materials confirm the following: 'Young Man with a Cap' 61 × 37.8 cm, acc. 70.185 (Tannahill Bequest; purchased from G.J. Demotte in 1932 → bequeathed in 1970); 'A Woman' 60.3 × 46.4 cm, acc. 26.16 (Zborowski collection, purchased February 18, 1926). The exact accession number and dimensions of 'Portrait of a Young Woman' (c.1918) differ from source to source, so it is best to confirm them in the museum's official records. The year of 'Young Man with a Cap' is sometimes generalized as 'early 20th century' in some sources, but multiple sources, including the Rome catalogue, specify 1919.
  • The Tannahill bequest comprises 557 works — low: It is confirmed that Tannahill was an heir to the J.L. Hudson department store fortune and that, after his death in 1969, his collection was bequeathed to the DIA in 1970. However, the figure of 'about 557 works' may differ from source to source, so it is best taken as an approximate scale.
Sources (13)
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