Jeune fille au chien by Berthe Morisot

Berthe Morisot
1841-1895 | French

Jeune fille au chien
(Young girl with dog)

Stamped with signature "Berthe Morisot" (lower left)
Oil on canvas

A pioneering figure of Impressionism, Berthe Morisot stands out not only as a leader of this revolutionary movement but also as one of the most groundbreaking women artists in history. This extraordinarily rare masterpiece, Jeune fille au chien, is among her largest and most beautiful works available today.

Glowing with a luminous palette and an ethereal softness, Jeune fille au chien was painted in one of the most important years of Morisot’s life. In the spring of 1892, Morisot achieved a monumental milestone with her first solo retrospective at Paris's prestigious Boussod, Valadon et Cie gallery—a first for a woman Impressionist. Just one month before the exhibition opened, her husband of nearly two decades, Eugène Manet, died. Grief-stricken, Morisot entered the most innovative year of her career, seeking solace in her art and reinventing herself as an artist.

Set in Morisot's garden at 40 Rue de Villejust, this captivating composition centers the stunning Jeanne Fourmanoir, the famous model who posed for both Morisot and Renoir during this period. Fourmanoir's distinctive cap and hair harmonize with the lush foliage, exemplifying the stylistic dialogue between Morisot and Renoir. This work reveals Morisot's evolution toward her softer, richer textures compared to her earlier energetic brushwork, creating a hazy, dreamlike quality that mirrors the emotional world of the artist in the final years of her life.

Fourmanoir was one of Morisot’s favorite subjects, frequently appearing in Morisot's iconic masterpieces, most notably as a cherry picker in Le Cerisier of 1891, now at the Musée Marmottan Monet. Our painting depicting this famed model also has distinguished provenance, once belonging to the major American collectors Ralph Coe of Cleveland and Harry and Doris Rubin of New York. Its remarkable exhibition history includes the important 1896 Durand-Ruel exhibition, organized shortly after Morisot's death by her distinguished peers: Edgar Degas, Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Stephane Mallarmé. An incredible tribute to one of Impressionism's most visionary talents, this show was a grand event in the Parisian art scene.

Born in Bourges, France, in 1841, Berthe Morisot came from a wealthy family. Like many young girls of her social class, she received private art lessons beginning at the age of 11. Her teacher, the painter Joseph Guichard, helped to introduce her to the Parisian art scene. Through him, Morisot made the acquaintance of Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot and Édouard Manet, both of whom would have a profound impact on her career and artistic style. Morisot exhibited regularly at the Paris Salon from 1864 to 1873 until, in 1874, she officially joined and became a vital leader of the Impressionists, exhibiting in all but one of the eight Impressionist shows.

Today, Morisot's paintings remain some of the rarest Impressionist works on the market—she produced just 416 oil paintings, significantly less than Monet, Degas and Renoir. The majority of Morisot’s works are held in prestigious museum collections worldwide, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Tate Modern in London, the Musée du Louvre and the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. She has also been the focus of endless scholarship and landmark exhibitions, including a major retrospective at The Barnes Foundation in 2019 that traveled to the Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec, the Dallas Museum of Art and the Musée d’Orsay.

Painted 1892

Canvas: 25 1/4" high x 31 1/2" wide (64.14 x 80.01 cm)
Framed: 35" high x 41" wide x 2 3/8" deep (88.90 x 104.14 x 5.91 cm)

View the Dossier

Provenance:
C.W. Kraushaar Galleries, New York (by 1926)
Ralph M. Coe, Cleveland (aquired from the above, 1926)
Sale, Sotheby's New York, January 14, 1959, lot 70 (sold by the above)
Milch Gallery, New York (acquired at the above sale)
Harry and Doris Rubin, New York (acquired from the above in 1959)
Sale, Sotheby’s New York, May 7, 2008, lot 10 (sold by the above)
Private collection (acquired at the above sale)
M.S. Rau, New Orleans

Literature:
J. Rewald, The History of Impressionism, New York, 1961, p. 573 (illustrated in color)
M.-L. Bataille and G. Wildenstein, Berthe Morisot, Catalogue des peintures, pastels et aquarelles, Paris, 1961, p. 44, no. 311 (illustrated fig. 318)
A. Clairet, D. Montalant and Y. Rouart, Berthe Morisot, Catalogue Raisonné de l’oeuvre Peint, Paris, 1997, p. 267, no. 315 (illustrated)

Exhibited:
Paris, Galerie Durand-Ruel et Cie., Berthe Morisot (Madame Eugène Manet), Exposition de son oeuvre, March 1896, p. 19, no. 29 (dated 1887)
Paris, Galerie Bernheim, Retrospective de Berthe Morisot, June – July 1922
Chicago, The Arts Club, Berthe Morisot, March-April 1943, no. 26 (titled Girl with a Dog in a Garden)
New Haven, Yale University Art Gallery, Pictures Collected by Yale Alumni, May-June 1956, no. 87 (illustrated; titled Jeanne Foumanoir in Madame Morsiot’s Garden, with the Little Dog)
New York, Wildenstein & Co., Berthe Morisot, November-December 1960, no. 58 (illustrated; titled Jeanne Fourmanoir et son Petit Chien Colas)
Turin, Galleria Civica d’arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Berthe Morisot, Impressionist painter, 16 October 2024 – 9 March 2025, no. 38