Raised in a privileged Parisian milieu, Morisot was the only woman to contribute to the first exhibition of the avant-garde Impressionist group, which opened in the spring of 1874. She painted this picture the following summer, during a joint vacation on the Normandy coast by the Morisot and Manet families. It was during this trip that Morisot became engaged to Manet’s brother, Eugène. Using radically simplified means (a few wispy strokes describe the seated figure’s veil; the sea and sky are flat as the canvas on which they’re painted), Morisot conjured a comfortably bourgeois scene. Her models were most likely her sister Edma and Edma’s daughter. Their pointed remove from the beach confirms their middle-class respectability—and, indeed, that of the painter herself.
Details
- Artist Name: Berthe Morisot (French, 1841-1895)
- Title: In a Villa at the Seaside
- Date: 1874
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 19-3/4 x 24 in. (50.2 x 61 cm)
- Credit Line: Norton Simon Art Foundation
- Accession Number: M.1979.21.P
- Copyright: © Norton Simon Art Foundation
Object Information
[Ernest?] Hoschedé [(1837-1890), Paris].
Edgar Degas Estate, Paris, by 1896 (sale, Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, 26-27 March 1918, lot 83, as Femme et enfant sur une terrasse au bord de l’eau, to);
[Paul Rosenberg, Paris, buying for];
Mme. Fernand Halphen, Paris, by inheritance to;
Georges Halphen, Paris, sold 1 May 1979 to;
[Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc., New York, stock no. 6037, sold 1/2 share to [Galerie du Cirque, Paris], sold 12 June 1979 to];
Norton Simon Art Foundation.
Berthe Morisot (Madame Eugène Manet)...Exposition de son oeuvre
- Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel, 1896-03-05 to 1896-03-21
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North American distribution, plus 10% international; English language; Initial print run on VHS and DVD to total 10,000 copies, Impressionism (college-level course on video tape, narrated by Richard Brettell),
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Katerina Atanassova, et al., Canada and Impressionism: 1880-1930, 5.2 p. 73 ; p. 75 (ill.)
Angoulvent, Monique, Berthe Morisot, no. 43
Patin, Sylvie, Berthe Morisot 1841-1895, color fig. 5 p. 47
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