Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz

Identification

Published titles

English: Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz.

Date

1916–17? The museum and Wayne date the work 1916. Lipchitz recalled a 1916 commission; later catalogue compilers and this investigation also record 1917.

Medium

Oil on canvas (reused support).

Dimensions

81.3 × 54.3 cm. Wayne: 80.7 × 54 cm.

Signature

Signed modigliani at top right; the word LIPCHITZ at upper centre.

Present location

Art Institute of Chicago, inv. 1926.221. Helen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection.

Catalogue numbers

Legal note on MR: This investigation has not had access to MR’s catalogue raisonné; all research here is based on open sources, publications and exhibitions. By no means has that catalogue been copied at any point. Modigliani Project and Modigliani Initiative are marked YES when the work is published or otherwise recorded by those projects, even if no catalogue number is assigned; otherwise the field is marked ?.

Provenance

1. Amedeo Modigliani.
2. Jacques Lipchitz, Paris, acquired from the artist, 1916 (Lipchitz’s recollection; later studies date the painting 1917).
3. Exchanged with Léonce Rosenberg, Paris, c. 1921–22.
4. Frederick C. and Helen Birch Bartlett, Chicago, 1922–26.
5. Gift to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1926, inv. 1926.221.

The sequence follows the published museum, sale, and catalogue record in this investigation. Gaps and uncertain transfers are marked as such.

Selected bibliography

Book-length publications are marked with a footnote giving a full citation. Exhibition catalogues appear in both this list and the exhibition list when this investigation recorded them in both places. Where this investigation listed a long run of secondary mentions, only the principal catalogues and museum or sale references are retained here.

• Galerie Montaigne, Paris, 1920, cat. 14, as Portrait du sculpteur L. et de sa femme.
• Jacques Lipchitz, “I Remember Modigliani,” Art News 49 (February 1951).
• Arthur Pfannstiel, 1956, no. 115 (dated 1916).¹
• Joseph Lanthemann, 1970, no. 116 (dated 1916).²
• Ambrogio Ceroni and Leone Piccioni, 1970, no. 161 (dated 1917).³
• Neal Benezra, “A Study in Irony: Modigliani’s Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz,” Museum Studies 12, no. 2 (1986).
• Christian Parisot, 1991, no. 27/1917.⁴
• Osvaldo Patani, 1991–94, no. 166.⁵
• Kenneth Wayne, 2002, p. 86, cat. 9 (dated 1916).⁶
• Mason Klein, 2004, p. 11, fig. 10.⁷
• Nancy Ireson and Simonetta Fraquelli, 2017, p. 115.⁸

Exhibitions

• Paris, Galerie Montaigne, 1920, no. 14.
• Chicago and Boston, Birch-Bartlett Collection, 1925.
• Chicago, A Century of Progress, 1933, no. 702; 1934, no. 356.
• New York, Museum of Modern Art, Twentieth-Century Portraits, 1942–43; Twentieth-Century Italian Art, 1949.
• Cleveland and New York, Museum of Modern Art, 1951.
• Rome, VI Quadriennale, 1952, cat. 9; Paris and London, Twentieth-Century Masterpieces, 1952.
• Düsseldorf and Zurich, 1991, no. 49.
• Buffalo, Fort Worth and Los Angeles, 2002–03, no. 9.
• Moscow, Pushkin Museum, 2007; Bonn, 2009, no. 85.
• Fort Worth, The Age of Picasso and Matisse, 2013–14.
• London, Tate Modern, 2017–18.

Notes

D’Atri papers no. 205, Portrait du sculpteur Lipchitz et sa femme, no size or date, Collection Lipchitz, Paris, 1931.

This investigation records a reused canvas.

This investigation records a drawn ear painted over the colour.

This investigation notes a difference of eye construction between the two sitters.

The Art Institute of Chicago dates Jacques and Berthe Lipchitz to 1916, oil on canvas, 81.3 × 54.3 cm, inv. 1926.221, Helen Birch Bartlett Memorial Collection, signed upper right and inscribed LIPCHITZ upper centre. The museum follows Lipchitz’s recollection of a 1916 commission. Catalogue dates of 1917 are retained above as the other published reading.

This investigation marked several fields as still being checked. The facts above are those already published; where sources disagree, both readings are given.