PAST EXHIBITION

Complete Checklist

The order of the works in the checklist corresponds loosely to their arrangement in the exhibition.

  • Watercolor, charcoal, and ink image of singing man with three onlookers holding cups

    Honoré Daumier (1808–1879) 
    The Drinkers, c. 1860
    Watercolor, pen and ink, and charcoal on cream laid paper
    9 7/16 x 10 1/2 in. (23.9 x 26.7 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1504

    In this depiction of laborers in blue work aprons or overalls, Daumier treats the subject of drink-inspired song. The two men at center belt out a tune to the apparent amusement, or embarrassment, of their companion at left. At right, a fourth man devotes full attention to his beverage.

  • Watercolor image of three robed men talking

    Honoré Daumier (1808–1879) 
    Three Lawyers Conversing, c. 1862–65
    Watercolor, pen and ink, charcoal, chalk, and gouache on cream wove paper
    12 15/16 x 9 3/4 in. (32.9 x 24.8 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1499

    Lawyers appear frequently in Daumier’s satires. Having been jailed for his political caricatures, the artist had ample opportunity to see lawyers at work. This trio’s upturned noses suggest an undeserved attitude of authority, and their theatrical poses and symmetrical arrangement underscore the artificiality of their conduct.  

  • Charcoal and black chalk drawing of knitting woman seated by table

    François Bonvin (1817–1887) 
    Servant Knitting, 1861
    Charcoal and black chalk with stumping and erasing on beige laid paper 
    15 11/16 x 12 5/16 in. (39.8 x 31.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 2012.12

    A woman in a humble interior concentrates on her knitting. Bonvin’s precise handling of chalk and charcoal captures the play of light and shadow on her face and pristine white apron. Emulating seventeenth-century Dutch genre paintings, Bonvin produced many such scenes of daily life to great acclaim. 

  • Red chalk drawing with cows in landscape with water and trees

    Charles-François Daubigny (1817–1878) 
    Cows at a Watering Hole, c. 1863
    Red chalk with stumping on cream wove paper
    11 1/8 x 17 7/16 in. (28.3 x 44.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1991.2

    Daubigny belonged to a group of artists who embraced the local environment as their primary subject. Here he explores the reflective surface of still water in the warm light of a rising or setting sun. 

  • Pastel drawing of figure walking in field with outstretched arm

    Jean-François Millet (1814–1875) 
    The Sower, c. 1865
    Pastel and Conté crayon on beige wove paper, mounted on wood-pulp board
    18 1/2 x 14 ¾ in (47 x 37.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts; Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Norman Hirschl, 1982.8

    Silhouetted against the vast, empty landscape, the heroic laborer strides purposefully as he distributes seeds. Tinges of blue and rose in the clouds are repeated in the peasant’s clothing, uniting sky and land through the figure. 

  • Pencil drawing with man giving a coin to a child

    Gustave Courbet (1819–1877) 
    Alms from a Beggar at Ornans, 1868
    Graphite with stumping, squared, with touches of crayon on cream wove paper
    11 5/16 x 8 11/16 in. (28.7 x 22.1 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1846

    A beggar becomes an almsgiver in this social critique that Courbet produced for publication after his controversial painting of the same subject. The impoverished man, who appears to have come from the city in the distance, takes pity on a gypsy family, suggesting that theirs is a world in which only the poor give to the poor.

  • Black chalk drawing with four men drinking near a wine press

    Léon-Augustin Lhermitte (1844–1925) 
    The Wine Press, c. 1872
    Black chalk with stumping and erasing on beige laid paper, pieced together
    12 x 18 13/16 in. (30.4 x 47.7 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1986.17

    Lhermitte frequently depicted rural laborers. These four men with fatigued bodies and expressions pause from their work. The dimly glowing light and the harmonious arrangement of the figures lend an overall sense of melancholy, underscoring the theme of long-awaited rest. 

  • Print of boy and dog

    Édouard Manet (1832–1883) 
    Boy with a Dog, from the portfolio Eight Etchings by Manet, 1862
    Etching and aquatint on cream laid paper
    Sheet: 14 1/16 x 10 3/8 in. (35.7 x 26.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.79

    One of eight sheets that formed part of Manet’s first portfolio of prints, this work is based on a drawing probably made from life several years earlier. The subject is the artist’s young assistant and occasional model Alexandre, who committed suicide in his studio in 1859. He is recalled here in a moment of happiness with a dog nearly his size.  

  • Print of seated woman

    Édouard Manet (1832–1883)
    The Toilette, from the portfolio Eight Etchings by Manet, 1862
    Etching printed in brown-black on cream laid paper 
    Sheet: 20 9/16 x 13 7/8 in. (52.2 x 35.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.80

    This bather draws inspiration from works by Rembrandt and Watteau. By leaving much of the area of the bather’s body lightly worked within an overall dark atmosphere created by a network of vigorously drawn lines, Manet conveys a sense of the woman’s sudden physical exposure. 

  • Print of boy holding basket and dog

    Édouard Manet (1832–1883) 
    The Urchin, 1862
    Lithograph on cream chine collé on white wove paper
    Sheet: 20 1/16 x 14 15/16 in. (51 x 37.9 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.81

    This lithograph is a reinterpretation of one of the artist’s canvases, which he based on paintings by Murillo and Velázquez known through reproductive prints. Manet’s image of a street-smart gamin attests to the artist’s immersion in Spanish art, as well as the productive exchange between painting and prints that informed his work in both media. 

  • Print of woman dressed in black, wearing a mantilla and holding a fan

    Édouard Manet (1832–1883)
    Exotic Flower (Woman in a Mantilla), 1868
    Etching and aquatint printed in brown and black on cream laid paper
    Sheet: 14 1/4 x 9 9/16 in. (36.2 x 24.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1986.18

    Manet produced this Goyaesque figure for inclusion in an 1869 publication of etchings and poems. It appeared side by side with a sonnet by the contemporary poet Armand Renaud about a woman’s intoxicating beauty.

  • Print of a firing squad, dressed in uniform, executing a standing man, while figures in the background look on

    Édouard Manet (1832–1883) 
    Execution of Maximilian, 1868, printed 1884
    Lithograph on white chine collé on white wove paper 
    Sheet: 20 ¼ x 26 5/8 in. (51.4 x 67.7)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, Acquired in memory of Rafael Fernandez (Curator of Prints and Drawings, 1975–1994), with contributions from his friends, colleagues, and students, 2000.4

    In 1867, Napoleon III of France appointed Austrian Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian emperor of Mexico, which was then under French occupation. Realizing the impossibility of ruling through Maximilian, Napoleon gradually withdrew military support, leaving Maximilian unprotected. On June 19, 1867, Maximilian and two of his generals were executed by Mexican nationalists, an event that sparked a storm of controversy in France. Manet dedicated multiple canvases, as well as this lithograph, to the incident. The print was intended for wide circulation but banned from publications by the French government until after the artist’s death.

  • Print of men in uniform firing guns at men near a barricade in a city

    Édouard Manet (1832–1883) 
    The Barricade, 1871, printed 1884
    Lithograph on cream chine collé on white wove paper
    Sheet: 25 1/16 x 21 13/16 in. (63.7 x 55.4 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 2007.7.1

    The Barricade represents the bloody repression of Parisian rebels — the Communards — by France's national guard in 1871. The sketch-like quality of the lithographic crayon makes it appear as if the artist captured the horrific action while it was occurring. 

  • Print of figures seated in a cafe

    Édouard Manet (1832–1883) 
    At the Café, 1874
    Gillotage on beige wove paper
    Sheet: 12 1/2 x 16 1/4 in. (31.7 x 41.2 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.82 

    This sheet is one of very few known impressions of Manet’s gillotage of a scene in the Café Guerbois, a Parisian establishment frequented by artists and writers. Gillotage was a new photomechanical process capable of conveying painterly effects. 

  • Pencil drawing of a woman's face

    Pierre Puvis de Chavannes (1824–1898) 
    Study of a Woman’s Head, c. 1865
    Graphite with stumping on beige wove paper
    6 7/8 x 5 5/16 in. (17.4 x 13.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1716 

    The idealized, chiseled features of the head in this study bring to mind classical sculpture, which Puvis de Chavannes emulated in much of his work. By stumping — rubbing the graphite into the grainy paper with a small roll of leather — he achieves a smooth, stone-like finish, particularly in the hair. 

  • Pencil drawing of nude female figure

    William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825–1905) 
    Study of Venus for “Apollo and the Muses in Olympus,” c. 1867
    Graphite with touches of white chalk on beige wove paper
    18 7/16 x 12 in. (46.8 x 30.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1578 

    This study for one of the figures in the ceiling of the Grand Théâtre in Bordeaux embodies the academic principles of proportion and finish to which Bouguereau fully subscribed. The figure of Venus accords precisely with the classical ratio of a body exactly seven times the length of its head. 

  • Black and red chalk studies of a sculpture of a male figure

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Studies of the Borghese Gladiator, c. 1853–56
    Black and red chalks on cream laid paper 
    9 1/2 x 12 5/16 in. (24.2 x 31.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1971.41

    Underlying Degas’s prowess as a draftsman was a thorough academic training that included drawing after Old Master paintings and Greek and Roman sculpture in the Louvre. An example of this practice, this student work combines images of the celebrated antique marble gladiator, represented from different viewpoints, with the profile of the head of another sculpture.

  • Pencil drawing of bearded man from two angles

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Two Portrait Studies of a Man, c. 1856–57
    Graphite with stumping and touches of white chalk on pink wove paper
    17 5/16 x 11 3/8 in. (44 x 28.9 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1393

    This virtuoso drawing was made from life during Degas’s Italian sojourn. The artist studied the half-length figure up close, ingeniously combining two views into a harmonious composition. The facial features and smooth skin are rendered lifelike through fine gradations of light and shadow, achieved through blended strokes of graphite and the addition of white highlights. 

  • Black and red chalk drawing of dead fox

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917)
    Study for “Dead Fox in the Forest,” c. 1861–64
    Black and red chalks on cream wove paper
    8 1/16 x 10 15/16 in. (20.4 x 27.7 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1396

    In this delicate sheet from early in Degas’s career, the artist observes a dead fox’s limp body. Long and short directional strokes coalesce into a convincing representation of the coarse fur of the animal’s coat while a combination of looser marks with the white of the paper suggests the softer underbelly. The red stamp bearing Degas’s name at lower left was applied to this sheet — and to the many others that remained in the artist’s studio until his death — on the occasion of his estate sales of 1918 and 1919. 

  • Pencil drawing of a woman's face

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Study for “Madame Julie Burtey,” c. 1867 
    Black and dark-brown graphite on blued white wove paper
    12 1/16 x 8 1/2 in. (30.6 x 21.6 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1406

    Along with some notebook sketches and a nearly full-length seated study, this work led to an oil painting (unfinished) now in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. The inscription “Mme Jules Bertin,” one of the many names under which the subject has been known, was added by a later hand. 

  • Pencil drawing of figures on horseback

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    At the Races, c. 1860–62
    Graphite and black chalk with stumping on beige-pink paper, pieced together
    13 11/16 x 18 7/8 in. (34.7 x 48 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1401

    In this early study, jockeys slowly ride their horses to the start of a race. Degas works out the complex overlapping of figures and the positioning of five sets of horses’ legs. Rethinking the placement of one, he enlarged his sheet with additional strips of paper and drew, in greater detail, a single leg below the main group. 

  • Chalk drawing of leaping horse

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Study for “Scene from the Steeplechase: The Fallen Jockey,” 1866
    Black and dark-brown chalks with stumping on blued white wove paper
    9 1/8 x 14 1/8 in. (23.2 x 35.9 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1397

    Degas made this drawing in preparation for a painting now in the National Gallery of Art (Washington, D.C.), in which a jockey falls from his horse during a steeplechase — a challenging event requiring horse and rider to leap over various obstacles. The horse’s tail and the stirrup swing backward as the animal flies through the air. 

  • Painted image of man on horseback

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Man Riding, c. 1875–77
    Brush and black essence with additions in brown and white gouache and white chalk on oiled brown wove paper
    9 11/16 x 13 1/2 in. (24.6 x 34.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1400

    Here a trainer or groom in his typical garb of jacket and bowler hat leans forward on his horse in a galloping position. Degas applied oil to the paper to enrich its tone and create a smooth surface, on which he applied essence — thinned oil paint — with rapid movements of the brush.  

  • Print of three ballet dancers on stage

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Three Ballet Dancers, c. 1878–80
    Monotype on cream laid paper
    Sheet: 14 x 20 3/16 in. (35.6 x 51.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1386

    Depicted from the vantage point of a seat in the balcony of a theater, two dancers execute rapid jumps in unison while a third kneels in a dramatic pose. To produce this monotype, Degas covered a metal plate entirely with black ink and used a cloth and his fingertips selectively to wipe ink away. He then pressed the plate onto paper and gave the unique impression to his friend Alphonse Cherfils, as indicated by the inscription. 

  • Charcoal drawing of bearded man playing the violin

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    The Violinist: Study for “The Rehearsal,” c. 1879
    Charcoal with white chalk on blue-gray laid paper
    17 1/8 x 11 15/16 in. (43.5 x 30.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute,
    Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1395

    This rapid sketch is a study for a painting of a ballet rehearsal in the Frick’s permanent collection. In this sheet, Degas devotes his attention to the position of the violin accompanist and the back-and-forth motion of his bow. Touches of white chalk indicating light shining on the man’s face make clear that Degas was already picturing the man in relation to the studio windows in the painting.  

  • Graphite drawing of sarcophagus with reclining male and female figures

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    At the Louvre: The Etruscan Sarcophagus, c. 1879
    Graphite and gray wash on blued white wove paper
    4 1/4 x 6 7/16 in. (10.8 x 16.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1971.36

    In this drawing, made in front of the Louvre’s terracotta Sarcophagus of the Spouses from the sixth century  b.c.e., Degas records the work in its gallery surroundings, taking careful note of the reflections of light on the glass case. In an etched composition he developed from the drawing, Degas included the American artist Mary Cassatt, standing and looking in, and her sister, Lydia, seated and consulting a book. 

  • Black chalk drawing of a figure on a rearing horse

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Jockey on a Rearing Horse, 1890s
    Black chalk and pastel on cream wove paper
    9 3/16 x 14 3/16 in. (23.3 x 36 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1399 

    Horseracing was a favorite subject of Degas’s. In this later exploration of the theme, Degas gives emphasis to the arrangement of the rearing horse’s head and front legs, seemingly caught in motion. His vigorous execution captures the musculature of the animal and the sheen of its coat. 

  • Charcoal drawing of woman standing in a bathtub

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    Woman Standing in a Bathtub, c. 1890–92
    Charcoal with stumping on beige wove paper
    17 x 11 5/8 in. (43.2 x 29.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1394

    This vigorously executed drawing of a woman absorbed in the intimate act of bathing, seemingly unaware of artist or viewer, is one of several of Degas’s late reprisals of the academic nudes he drew as a student. 

  • Charcoal drawing of standing nude female figure

    Edgar Degas (1834–1917) 
    After the Bath, c. 1891–92
    Charcoal with stumping on beige wove paper
    14 x 9 3/4 in. (35.5 x 24.8 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1408

    An example of Degas’s rethinking of the classical subject of the bather, this sheet exhibits the confident, animated draftsmanship of the mature artist. 

  • Charcoal drawing of standing man with large head

    Claude Monet (1840–1926) 
    Caricature of a Man with a Snuff Box, c. 1858
    Charcoal heightened with white chalk on blue wove paper 
    23 1/8 x 13 in. (58.8 x 33 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 2006.10

    This signed sheet by the young Monet, then known as Oscar, is one of several caricatures he made to earn a living at the outset of his career. Employing his favored format of a large head on a tiny body, supported by even smaller legs and feet, Monet juxtaposes the giant nostrils with the snuff and the handkerchief in the man’s pocket—humorously prefiguring the enormous sneeze that will probably occur following its inhalation. 

  • Black chalk drawing of landscape with boats, water, and buildings

    Claude Monet (1840–1926) 
    The Port at Touques, c. 1864
    Black chalk on blued white laid paper
    8 1/4 x 13 in. (21 x 33 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 2006.5

    In this early work, Monet sketched this close-up view of a fishing village in Normandy in bright daylight. 

  • Black chalk drawing of landscape with boats, water, and buildings

    Claude Monet (1840–1926) 
    View of Rouen, 1883
    Black chalk on blued white Gillot paper
    Sheet: 12 5/16 x 18 11/16 in. (31.3 x 47.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1914

    In this drawing executed on a special textured support, Monet translated one of his paintings into graphic form for the purpose of reproducing it in print. When photomechanically transferred to the zinc plate, the dense passages of looping and zigzagging lines, in combination with the vertical striations of the paper, would achieve a tonal effect. 

  • Watercolor painting of small boats and larger boat

    Berthe Morisot (1841–1895) 
    Before a Yacht, 1875
    Watercolor over graphite on cream wove paper
    8 1/8 x 10 9/16 in. (20.7 x 26.8 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1964

    Morisot captures the transitory effects of nature in this virtuoso sheet. She suggests the rocking motion of the boats and the atmospheric bright sunlight that filters through the air.  

  • Pastel drawing of street with figures, buildings, cars, and carriages

    Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) 
    Boulevard de Rochechouart, 1880
    Pastel on beige wove paper
    23 9/16 x 28 15/16 in. (59.9 x 73.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1996.5

    Lively strokes of pastel in a multitude of colors create a transparent atmosphere that envelops figures and architecture in the flow of urban life. The high viewpoint plunges the viewer into this Parisian scene. 

  • Print of three figures in a field with house in background
    Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) 
    Peasant Women Weeding the Grass, c. 1894
    Etching printed in blue, red, yellow, and black on cream laid paper
    Sheet: 6 5/16 x 7 1/2 in. (16 x 19 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.91
     

    In this late work — a proof impression with the artist’s own notations on the sheet — Pissarro renders simplified forms with strong outlines, color contrasts, and minimal detail. 

  • Print of two girls in large hats

    Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841–1919) 
    Pinning the Hat: Second Plate, c. 1898
    Lithograph printed in black, gray, orange, green, mustard, rust, and pink on cream laid paper
    Sheet: 35 5/8 x 24 9/16 in. (90.5 x 62.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.99 

    Renoir’s interest in printmaking late in his career coincided with the popularization of color lithography as a fine-art medium. For this print, Renoir worked with crayons directly on the lithographic stones, replicating the soft, powdery qualities of his pastels. 

  • Print of four nude male figures in landscape

    Paul Cézanne (1839–1906) 
    The Bathers: Large Plate, 1898
    Lithograph printed in black, green, yellow-green, orange, gray, blue, and purple-blue on cream laid paper
    Sheet: 19 x 24 13/16 in. (48.3 x 63.1 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.26

    Working in collaboration with a professional printer, Cézanne reproduced the composition of one of his most famous paintings, Bathers at Rest (1876–77, The Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia) in the widely circulating medium of color lithography. The distribution of blues, greens, and the cream tone of the paper creates a vivid sense of dappled light. 

  • Black print on yellow paper showing four figures

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Old Women of Arles, from the Volpini Suite, 1889
    Zincograph on yellow wove paper
    Sheet: 17 1/4 x 21 3/8 in. (43.8 x 54.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.69

    The five zincographs on bright yellow paper in this exhibition are part of Gauguin’s Volpini Suite, a series of prints based loosely on his works in other media. The suite takes its name from the owner of the café where Gauguin and other avant-garde artists staged their own exhibition in opposition to the state-sanctioned Exposition Universelle. This sheet is based almost directly on a painting made in Arles during Gauguin’s two-month stay with Vincent van Gogh. The yellow paper used throughout the suite may reflect Gauguin’s esteem for Van Gogh’s sunflowers and his famous yellow house. 

  • Black print on yellow paper showing standing female figures and goat in landscape

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Martinique Pastorals, from the Volpini Suite, 1889
    Zincograph on yellow wove paper
    Sheet: 17 ¼ x 21 5/8 in. (43.8 x 55 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.67

    The graceful curving lines of the rolling hillsides, the heart-shaped leaves, and the women in native dress evoke a timeless utopia, far from the cares of the modern world. In this print and others inspired by his travels to Martinique in 1886, Gauguin focused on activities of daily life. 

  • Print on yellow paper showing busts of a male and a female figure, near a tree

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Human Misery, from the Volpini Suite, 1889
    Zincograph printed in reddish-brown ink with borderlines in graphite on yellow wove paper
    Sheet: 17 1/4 x 21 1/4 in. (43.9 x 53.9 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.61

    The sorrowful woman, head in hands, and the male figure with his brow clouded by shadow call to mind the fallen Adam and Eve with the Tree of Knowledge behind them. 

  • Black print on yellow paper showing two standing female figures

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Joys of Brittany, from the Volpini Suite, 1889
    Zincograph on yellow wove paper
    Sheet: 17 ¼ x 21 1/4 in. (43.9 x 53.9 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.58

    This image of girls in regional dress performing a traditional dance is characteristic of the bucolic themes of Gauguin’s work in Brittany. With the deliberate naiveté of his manner and the mask-like faces of the young dancers, the artist sought to evoke the primitive quality that he perceived in this region of northern France. 

  • Print on yellow paper of nude male bather

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Breton Bathers, from the Volpini Suite, 1889
    Zincograph on yellow wove paper
    Sheet: 17 1/4 x 21 9/16 in. (43.8 x 54.7 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.59

    Gauguin’s emphasis on sinuous outline, along with the flattened space and upturned perspective, reveals his interest in Japanese prints. The image was drawn on a grained zinc plate with both crayon and tusche (a greasy liquid used in lithography) applied with a brush. This method of printmaking yields fine gradations from light to dark, as is evident here. 

  • Print of two embracing seated figures

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Te Faruru (Here We Make Love), from Noa Noa, Winter 1893–94
    Woodcut printed in black, light brown, yellow, and red on cream wove paper, mounted on beige cardboard
    Sheet: 14 1/8 x 8 1/16 in. (35.9 x 20.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.70

    This woodcut and three others in this exhibition are from a famous series known as Noa Noa (meaning “fragrant scent” in Tahitian), inspired by Gauguin’s stay in Tahiti from 1891 to 1893. The networks of white lines scratched into and gouged out of the hard surface of boxwood are characteristic of Gauguin’s woodcut technique. In this work, they impart a spectral quality to the entwined bodies of the lovers who emerge out of the darkness of night. 

  • Print of central seated deity flanked by other gods

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Te Atua (The Gods), from Noa Noa, Winter 1893–94
    Woodcut printed in black, brown, orange, red, and green on cream wove paper, mounted on beige cardboard
    Sheet: 8 1/8 x 14 1/16 in. (20.6 x 35.7 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.73

    In this frieze-like composition, a Javanese Buddha figure at center is flanked at left by two Tahitian gods: Hina, goddess of the moon, and her son Fatu, god of the earth. Above the central figure, the artist’s deep gouging into the woodblock creates an aura of pulsating light. 

  • Print of a woman curled up and lying down

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Manao Tupapau (Watched by the Spirits of the Dead), from Noa Noa, Spring/summer 1894
    Woodcut printed in yellow, orange, and black on beige wove paper
    Sheet: 9 13/16 x 15 ¾ in. (25 x 40 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1981.152

    In this reinterpretation of one of his most famous paintings, Gauguin presents a nude in a pose that suggests both birth and death. Two spirits in the background at right watch over her ominously. 

  • Print of standing nude female figure in landscape

    Paul Gauguin (1848–1903) 
    Nave Nave Fenua (Delightful Land), from Noa Noa, Spring/summer 1894
    Woodcut printed in black, dark orange, and yellow, with stencils in red, on beige wove paper
    Sheet: 15 11/16 x 9 3/16 in. (39.3 x 23.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.72

    The warm tones in this image of a figure in a lush landscape — a Polynesian Eve — are an exception to the prevalence of black throughout the series.  

  • Color print of a man and two women in conversation

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    The Englishman at the Moulin Rouge, 1892
    Lithograph printed in black, green, gray, blue, orange-red, and yellow on cream laid paper
    Sheet: 23 1/2 x 18 1/16 in. (59.7 x 45.9 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1968.17

    To contemporary viewers, Toulouse-Lautrec’s inclusion of recognizable figures in his scenes of famous Parisian nightspots added another level of interest. The cropping of the image enhances the sense of immediacy by bringing the viewer into the conversation between the two protagonists. The man’s inclined posture and leering expression make clear the nature of their exchange. 

  • Print of a woman dancing in a voluminous dress

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    Miss Loïe Fuller, 1893
    Lithograph printed in blue-gray, brown-aubergine, and yellow, touched with gold and silver powder on cream wove paper
    Sheet: 15 1/16 x 11 1/16 in. (38.2 x 28 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.105

    In this highly experimental lithograph, the sequential movement of Loïe Fuller’s famous stage performance in a voluminous transparent garment manipulated by long poles is captured in a swelling form that approaches abstraction. The addition of gold and silver dust to the print enhances the ethereal effect.  

  • Color print of woman in profile with hair ornaments

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    Mademoiselle Marcelle Lender, Bust-Length, 1895
    Lithograph printed in brown-green, yellow, red, dark pink, green, blue, gray, and yellow-green on cream wove paper
    Sheet: 19 9/16 x 14 ¾ in (49.6 x 37.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1442

    This actress and dancer — a late-life passion of the artist’s — appears in many of his works, most famously dancing the bolero. The color harmonies that set off her vivid orange hair, pale powdered face, and décolletage in this close-up portrait reveal Lautrec’s tenderness for his subject. 

  • Color print of a woman, seen from behind, letting down her hair

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901)
    Frontispiece from Elles, 1896
    Lithograph printed in olive green, blue, and orange on cream wove paper
    20 11/16 x 15 13/16 in. (52.5 x 40.2 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.107

    A monument in modern printmaking, Toulouse-Lautrec’s Elles portfolio has been interpreted as a chronicle of the daily lives of lesbians involved in the worlds of prostitution and entertainment. The evocative image of a woman in nightdress letting down her hair, seen from behind, in combination with the presence of a man’s top hat introduces one of the themes.

  • Print of woman reclining in a bed

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    Woman Reclining — Waking Up, from Elles, 1896
    Lithograph printed in gray on cream wove paper
    15 13/16 x 20 5/8 in. (40.2 x 52.4 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.110

    Here the rectangle of the sheet serves as the shape of a bed. From underneath a heap of disheveled bedclothes suggested by a nearly abstract pattern of undulating lines, the shaded, profiled head of a woman and a lax arm emerge. Through a half-opened eye, she regards the viewer/artist and presumed client with an air of familiarity.  

  • Color print of woman seated with legs apart

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    The Seated Clowness (Miss Cha-U-Kao), from Elles, 1896
    Lithograph printed in green-black, black-brown, yellow, red, and blue on cream wove paper
    20 11/16 x 15 13/16 in. (52.5 x 40.2 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.108

    This sheet features the contortionist dancer Miss Cha-U-Kao (a phonetic play on chahut-chaos or chaotic can-can). She is shown at rest, her outlandish costume, provocative pose, and brazen stare conveying her strong personality. Sharp outlines are set off against soft atmospheric effects achieved through a technique of blowing fine dots of ink on a lithographic stone. 

  • Color print of two women dancing together near another dancing couple, with other figures in the background

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    Dance at the Moulin Rouge, 1897
    Lithograph printed in gray-black, blue-gray, red, yellow, and green on cream wove paper
    18 1/2 x 14 in. (47 x 35.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.119

    Miss Cha-U-Kao is shown here waltzing with her lover in a moment of leisure at the Moulin Rouge. Their nearly identical walking suits and the shared contour line dividing them convey the couple’s intimacy. 

  • Color print of two women, in coats and hats, seated in a theater box, with a man in an adjoining box

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    Box in the Grand Tier, 1897
    Lithograph printed in black, orange-red, blue, beige, and yellow on cream wove paper
    20 1/4 x 15 9/16 in. (51.4 x 39.5 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.118

    In this print, another example of the artist’s blurring of portrait and genre scene, the plush red balustrade of a theater box frames two well-known demimondaines attending a performance. 

  • Chalk drawing of two men, one holding a whip, a woman, and a horse in a circus ring

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    At the Circus: Acrobats, 1899
    Black and color chalks on white wove paper
    9 15/16 x 14 in. (25.3 x 35.5 cm) 
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1429 

    This circus scene, along with At the Circus: The Dog Trainer, belongs to a large group of drawings that Toulouse-Lautrec made from memory while he was recuperating in a medical clinic from alcoholism and a mental breakdown. The attenuated bodies and expressive gestures of the figures reveal the artist’s undiminished mastery of line. 

  • Chalk drawing of two men and dogs in a circus ring

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    At the Circus: The Dog Trainer, 1899
    Black and color chalks, over graphite, on white wove paper
    14 x 9 15/16 in. (35.5 x 25.3 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1955.1427

    This circus scene, along with At the Circus: Acrobats, belongs to a large group of drawings that Toulouse-Lautrec made from memory while he was recuperating in a medical clinic from alcoholism and a mental breakdown. The attenuated bodies and expressive gestures of the figures reveal the artist’s undiminished mastery of line.

  • Color print of two men on horseback, seen from behind

    Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (1864–1901) 
    The Jockey, 1899
    Lithograph printed in black, green, red, brown, beige, and blue on cream wove paper
    20 5/16 x 14 3/16 in. (51.6 x 36 cm)
    Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts, 1962.122

    The bold foreshortening of the horse and its diagonal thrust convey the force with which the jockey and his mount propel themselves into the open field. Intended as part of a portfolio of prints on the theme of the racetrack, it is the only one the artist, in declining health, completed. 

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