Thora Klinckowström

Identification

Published titles

English: Thora Klinckowström; Woman with Hat.

Date

Generally dated 1919.

Medium

Oil on canvas.

Dimensions

99.7 × 64.8 cm in this investigation, unconfirmed.

Signature

Signed modigliani at top right.

Present location

Private collection. After the Evelyn Sharp collection the work was lent by her heirs; the present owner is not named.

Sitter

Thora Klinckowström. The identification is supported by the sitter's autobiographical account and two associated preparatory drawings in the Statens Museum for Kunst. The work was included in the Barnes Foundation's 2022–23 technical and provenance study as one of four portraits absent from Ceroni; the exhibition documentation deliberately stopped short of presenting a final categorical conclusion regarding those non-Ceroni works, executed in November 1919 during Thora Klinckowström's stay in Paris.

Thora Klinckowström's autobiographical account describes sitting for Modigliani in Paris in 1919. Her testimony has been cited as an important element in identifying the portrait.

Catalogue numbers

Ceroni status: Not included in Ceroni. The work has subsequently been included in major exhibitions and technical/provenance research, including the Barnes Foundation's 2022–23 Modigliani study. The Barnes/Modigliani Initiative documentation explicitly avoided presenting a final categorical conclusion regarding the non-Ceroni works.

Modigliani Initiative YES?: Discussed in the Initiative's Barnes technical/provenance study; the Initiative explicitly states that it does not draw final conclusions regarding the four non-Ceroni works.

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. Léopold Zborowski, Paris.
2. Hugh Blaker Collection, London (said to have been acquired from Zborowski in 1921; the date is unconfirmed).
3. Victor Schuster Collection, London.
4. Possibly Reid & Lefevre Gallery, London.
5. James Archdale Collection, Birmingham (said to have been acquired from Schuster through Reid & Lefevre in 1942; the date is unconfirmed).
6. Perls Galleries, New York (acquired from Archdale in 1974).
7. Evelyn Sharp Collection (acquired 1975).
8. Exhibited at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, The Evelyn Sharp Collection, 1978 (exhibition, not a change of ownership).
9. Moderna Museet, Stockholm, loan by Evelyn Sharp's heirs.
10. Metropolitan Museum of Art, September 2010, loan from the heirs of Evelyn Sharp.
11. Descendants of Evelyn Sharp (Subsequent ownership not documented in this investigation).

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.

• Ludwig Meidner, “The Young Modigliani,” The Burlington Magazine 82, no. 481 (April 1943), p. 90, fig. D, as Jeanne Hébuterne.¹
• Murray Urquhart, “The Blaker Diary,” Apollo 78 (20 October 1963), pp. 293–298.²
• Inge Finsen, “Modigliani and Two Swedish Ladies,” Apollo 81 (February 1965), pp. 128–134.³
• Joseph Lanthemann, 1970, no. 414, as Woman with Hat (Thora Klinckowström), dated 1919.⁴
• William Fifield, Modigliani, New York, 1976, pp. 247–251.⁵
• The Evelyn Sharp Collection, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1978, pp. 66–67.
• Royal Academy of Arts, Italian Art in the 20th Century, London, Prestel, 1989, p. 141.
• Werner Schmalenbach, Prestel, 1990, p. 133, no. 81.⁶
• MR, Luxembourg 2002, no. 107, pp. 396–397, dated 1919.⁷
• Mason Klein, Modigliani: Beyond the Myth, 2004–2005, p. 159, pl. 75.⁸
• Simonetta Fraquelli, Royal Academy, 2006, p. 136.⁹
• MR, Pinacothèque de Paris, 2008, p. 183.

Exhibitions

• Birmingham, Museum and Art Gallery (date not specified in this investigation).
• London, Marlborough Fine Art, Nineteenth and Twentieth Century French Painting from English Private Collections, 1965.
• New York, Acquavella Galleries, Amedeo Modigliani loan exhibition, 1971, no. 52, dated 1919.
• New York, Perls Galleries, 30 Major Acquisitions, 1975, no. 20.
• New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, The Evelyn Sharp Collection, 1978.
• Stockholm, Moderna Museet, loan by the heirs of Evelyn Sharp.
• London, Royal Academy of Arts, Italian Art in the 20th Century, 1989, no. 65.
• Düsseldorf and Zurich, 1991, no. 83.
• Paris, Musée du Luxembourg, 2002, no. 107.
• Milan, Palazzo Reale, 2003, no. 72.
• New York, Toronto and Washington, Modigliani: Beyond the Myth, 2004–2005.
• London, Royal Academy of Arts, 2006, no. 49.
• Goyang, Aram & Harmony Art Museum, Amedeo Modigliani and Jeanne Hébuterne, 2008.
• New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, loan from the heirs of Evelyn Sharp, September 2010.
• Philadelphia, Barnes Foundation, Modigliani Up Close, 2022–2023.

Notes

Not listed in the D’Atri papers.

Two drawings in the Danish Royal Collection of Graphic Art have been associated with this portrait: inv. KKS1959-14, inscribed with the lines beginning “La Vita è un Dono dei Pochi…” and the address 8 rue de la Grande Chaumière; and inv. KKS1965-190, inscribed “modigliani / 11 Novembre / 1919.” Association with this canvas remains a hypothesis.

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