Edouard Vuillard
Vuillard painted ‘La Ravaudeuse’ at the height of his Nabis period, with the painting an exemplar of the movement’s emphasis on flatness and ornament. Adopting the Nabis principles, Vuillard celebrates pattern in the Madame Vuillard’s dress, while simultaneously highlighting the two dimensionality of the painting’s surface. The subject matter is painted with a similar muted colour palette to that of a number of his other great Nabis works including ‘Woman Darning’ (Musee d’Orsay, Paris), ‘The Green Interior’ (Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, New York) and ‘Interior with Marie bent over her sewing’ (Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven).
‘La Ravaudeuse’ demonstrates Vuillard’s interest in, and understanding of, Japanese prints. The wood blocks had caught the imagination of the Nabis due to their bold design and flatness, with the group regularly meeting to discuss Japanese prints. In 1887 van Gogh had even organised an exhibition dedicated to the medium at café Le Tambourin.
The tondo format of ‘La Ravaudeuse’ is apt for the subject matter both stylistically and practically. The oval shape, probably the bottom of a hat box, is reminiscent of a looking glass, focusing attention on Marie’s hands in the centre of the composition. The small format, like that of Vermeer’s diminutive domestic scenes, is reflective of Vuillard’s intimiste style in which the painting is imbued with a quiet power and familiarly.
‘La Ravaudeuse’ has an illustrious provenance, having first been the collection of his friend, Louis-Alfred Natason who founded La Revue blanche alongside his brothers Alexandre and Thadée. ‘La Revue blanche’ was a Parisian art and literary magazine which had contributions from such writers as Marcel Proust and Félix Fénéon. Natason was a great champion of Vuillard and the Nabis work.
Provenance
Louis-Alfred (Athis) Natanson, Paris
Denise Tabah (née Natanson), Rueil-Malmaison (by descent from the above)
Florence Seminario, Paris
Henri Tabah, Rueil-Malmaison
Sotheby's, London, 12 April 1972, lot 25 (consigned by the above)
E.V. Thaw, New York
Art Council Establishment, Vaduz
Samuel Josefowitz, (acquired in 1984)
Christie's, New York, 8 May 2002, lot 218 (consigned by the above)
William J. Levy (acquired from the above)
Exhibitions
Paris, Les Cadres, Peintres de La Revue blanche, 1936, no.52 (titled La Raccommodeuse)
Vevey, Musée Jenisch, Paris 1900, 1954, no.213
Paris, Galerie Maeght, La Revue blanche, 1966, no.58, p.27
Munich, Haus der Kunst, Edouard Vuillard - K.-X. Roussel, 1968, no.11
Houston, Museum of Fine Arts; Washington, D.C., Phillips Collection and Brooklyn Museum, The Intimate Interiors of Edouard Vuillard, 1989-1990, no.10 (titled Woman Mending)
Lausanne, Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Edouard Vuillard : la porte entrebâillée, 2000-2001, no.10, p.171
Literature
C. Guy, ‘Le barc de Bouteville’, L'Oeil, no.124, 1965, p.37, illus.
‘La Revue blanche no. 158-59’, Derrière le Miroir, Galerie Maeght., 1966, no.58, p.27
G. L. Mauner, The Nabis: Their History and Their Art, 1888-1896, Doctoral dissertation, Columbia University, 1978, fig.88, pp. 235 & 302, illus.
A. Georges, Symbolisme et décor: Vuillard, 1888-1905, Doctoral dissertation, Université Paris I, 1982, p.42
É. Daniel, Vuillard: l'espace de l'intimité, Doctoral dissertation, Institut d'Art et d'Archéologie, 1984, fig.141, p.389, illus.
P. Ciaffa, The Portraits of Edouard Vuillard, Doctoral dissertation, Columbia University, 1985, fig.77, pp.192-94, illus.
E.W. Easton, Edouard Vuillard's Interiors of the 1890s, Doctoral disseration, Yale University, 1989, pp.26 & 36
A. Ellridge, Gauguin et les nabis, Paris 1993, p.90, illus.
A. Salomon and G. Cogeval, Vuillard: The Inexhaustible Glance, Critical Catalogue of Paintings and Pastels, Vol. I, Paris, 2003, no.IV-11, p.232, illus.