Brief Report
The motif of Morisot's daughter Julie playing in the garden near Bougival was based on three small pastel sketches with further depictions of the girl as preparatory studies [Bataille/Wildenstein 1961, nos. 457, 461, 467; Morisot 2002, p. 218]. The picture was displayed as early as 1882, a year after it was painted, at the seventh Impressionist exhibition, where it was assigned the catalogue number 94 and bore the title "Baby". In spite of this prominent exposure in the exhibition, Morisot evidently did not think it necessary to sign the work. In the bottom righthand corner there is today a signature stamp, such as would normally only have been applied after the artist's death (fig. 7). Morisot's picture was painted on a unprimed fine canvas, such as we find fairly often in this artist's oeuvre [cf. Morisot 2002, nos. 53, 54, 56, 76, 84, 99]. Callen presumed that the non-use of a ground was not so much a deliberate technique as an emergency solution when the artist was using the verso of a canvas that had already been primed and painted on once before [Callen 2000, S. 67]. Thus in the present case we find verso a standard commercial white ground with the partly painted sketch of two horses' heads, which Morisot rejected at an early stage (fig. 2). She used the canvas and painted the unprimed side with the picture we have today of the Child among Hollyhocks. The open and sketchy painting technique, evidently with no assistance in the form of underdrawing lines, leaves the canvas visible in many places, although the latter's present brown colour is nothing like its original condition (figs. 10, 11). The reason for the change is the natural oxidation of the originally pale fabric, whose browning was further reinforced by a later coat of varnish, and quite certainly not intended by Morisot.
Berthe Morisot
Child among Hollyhocks, 1881, oil on canvas, 50.5 x 42.5 cm, WRM Dep. FC 614
Berthe Morisot
born on 14 January 1841 in Bourges,
died on 2 March 1895 in Paris
Further illustrations:
Fig. 02
Verso
Fig. 03
Raking light
Fig. 04
Transmitted light
Fig. 05
UV fluorescence
Fig. 06
UV fluorescence of verso
Fig. 07
Detail, signature in incident light (top) and UV fluorescence (bottom)
Fig. 08
Detail, top foldover edge, painted and with holes from an earlier stretching
Fig. 09
Detail, child
Fig. 10
Detail, semi-transparent and opaque paint applications on the bare canvas
Fig. 11
Detail, wet-in-wet and wet-on-dry paint applications
Fig. 12
Violet paint application, presumably cobalt violet, microscopic photograph (M = 1 mm)
Fig. 13
Drop-like emanation of browned binding medium in the cerulean layer, microscopic photograph (M = 1 mm)
