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The Artist's Wife (Périe, 1849–1887) Reading

1883
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 813

This composition, with its inventive cropping and velvety passages of pastel, reflects the influence of Degas, who befriended Bartholomé in the early 1880s. The sitter is the artist’s wife, Périe, known to be a "beautiful woman of delicate health, cultivated, and of supreme distinction." Upon her death in 1887 a grief-stricken Bartholomé abandoned painting and pastel. With Degas’s encouragement, he turned to sculpture; the monument he made for Périe's tomb marked the beginning of an accomplished career as a sculptor, working in metal and stone.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: The Artist's Wife (Périe, 1849–1887) Reading
  • Artist: Albert Bartholomé (French, Thiverval 1848–1928 Paris)
  • Date: 1883
  • Medium: Pastel and charcoal on wove paper, laid down on blue wove paper, laid down on stretched canvas
  • Dimensions: 19 7/8 x 24 1/8 in. (50.5 x 61.3 cm)
  • Classification: Drawings
  • Credit Line: Catharine Lorillard Wolfe Collection, Wolfe Fund, 1990
  • Object Number: 1990.117
  • Curatorial Department: European Paintings

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Grief, Albert Bartholomé French, Bronze, red sandstone, French, Paris
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late 19th century
Four Figure Studies for Monument to the Dead, Albert Bartholomé French, Charcoal "manilla" pencil
Four Figure Studies for Monument to the Dead
Albert Bartholomé
1889–93
Woman Having Her Hair Combed, Edgar Degas French, Pastel on light green wove paper, now discolored to warm gray, affixed to original pulpboard mount
Woman Having Her Hair Combed
Edgar Degas
ca. 1886–88
At the Milliner's, Edgar Degas French, Pastel on pale gray wove paper (industrial wrapping paper), laid down on silk bolting
At the Milliner's
Edgar Degas
1882
Portraits at the Stock Exchange, Edgar Degas French, Pastel on paper, pieced, and laid down on canvas
Portraits at the Stock Exchange
Edgar Degas
ca. 1878–79

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