Study of a Reclining Nude (c. 1841): Art, History and Details

Study of a Reclining Nude (c. 1841) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Isidore Pils (French, 1813/15–1875).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The languorous, sensuous pose of this woman is strongly reminiscent of Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres's popular paintings of odalisques, female slaves, and concubines in Turkish harems. Much of this canvas has been left thinly painted or entirely blank, suggesting that it was a figural study rather than a finished work of art. The French Academy in the 1800s viewed the depiction of the nude as the ultimate measure of an artist's skill. Because models changed poses frequently, students had to work quickly and without embellishment. Here the artist completed only those areas needed to emphasize the contours of the model's body.

Object facts

• Title: Study of a Reclining Nude
• Date: c. 1841
• Creator attribution: Isidore Pils (French, 1813/15–1875)
• Culture: France, 19th century
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on fabric
• Dimensions: Unframed: 72.5 x 92 cm (28 9/16 x 36 1/4 in.)
• Collection: Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960
• Department: Modern European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1939.63

Collection credit

Gift of Leonard C. Hanna Jr.

Further reading listed by the museum

• Francis, Henry. "An Odalisque by Thomas Couture." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 26, no. 8 (October 1939): 131-132
• Detroit Institute of Arts. The Two Sides of the Medal; French Painting from Gérôme to Gauguin. 1954.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.