Woman with a coral necklace

Identification

Published titles

English: Woman with a coral necklace; Woman with a coral necklace and bracelet; Woman in blue with a red necklace. The sitter is published as Madeleine Verdou, Verdon or Berdou; the spelling is not settled.

Date

1918 in Lanthemann, Ceroni and Patani. Klein dates the canvas c. 1919. D’Atri dates it 1917.

Medium

Oil on canvas.

Dimensions

92.5 × 65.3 cm (MR: 92.8 × 65.8 cm).

Signature

Signed modigliani at top right. This investigation notes a possible double signature.

Present location

Private collection (Nahmad Collection?). Sold by the Cincinnati Art Museum at Christie’s, New York, 4 May 2005.

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. Madeleine Berdou (or Verdou; the spelling is unconfirmed), Paris, acquired from the artist.
2. Zamaron Collection, Paris.
3. De Hauke & Co., New York.
4. M. Knoedler & Co., New York (1931).
5. Mary E. Johnston, Cincinnati (acquired 1944).
6. Private collection, gift from Johnston, 1967.
7. Cincinnati Art Museum, bequest of Mary E. Johnston (inv. 1976.1115).
8. Christie’s, New York, sale 1514, 4 May 2005, lot 51, sold for USD 4,608,000, for the museum’s acquisitions fund.
9. Private collection / Nahmad Collection?

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.

• Joseph Lanthemann, 1970, no. 284, as Woman seated with coral necklace, dated 1918.¹
• Ambrogio Ceroni and Leone Piccioni, 1970, no. 237, as Red necklace (Mme Verdou), dated 1918.²
• Osvaldo Patani, 1991–94, no. 249, as Madeleine Verdon, dated 1918.³
• Mason Klein, Modigliani: Beyond the Myth, 2004–05, pl. 67 (catalogue illustration; not in the exhibition).
• Simonetta Fraquelli, Royal Academy, 2006, no. 46.

Exhibitions

• New York, M. Knoedler & Co., A Century of French Painting, 1928, no. 46, as La femme au collier, Zamaron Collection.
• New York, De Hauke & Co., 1929, no. 12.
• Chicago, Arts Club of Chicago, 1929.
• Chicago, Renaissance Society, 1931.
• Baltimore Museum of Art, 1940.
• Cambridge, Fogg Art Museum, 1941.
• Cincinnati Art Museum, Johnston Collection exhibitions, 1945, 1956, 1959, 1972.
• Milan and Rome, Arte italiana del XX secolo da collezioni americane, 1959.
• Tokyo and Nagoya, 1985, no. 101.
• London, Royal Academy, 2006, no. 46.
• Tokyo and Osaka, 2008, no. 46 (MR).

Notes

D’Atri papers no. 168, as Woman in blue with red necklace, 92.5 × 65 cm, dated 1917; provenance Knoedler 1929.

Holes are visible at the four corners.

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