Head of an Italian Woman, by Jean-Léon Gérôme, c. 1847
Gallery mode Full size at the museum

Window mode follows your eyes with your camera, in this browser only: no picture or position leaves your device.

Head of an Italian Woman

Jean-Léon Gérôme (French, 1824–1904)

c. 1847

Medium
oil on fabric
Classification
Painting
Dimensions
Framed: 60 x 51 x 6 cm (23 5/8 x 20 1/16 x 2 3/8 in.); Unframed: 44.5 x 36 cm (17 1/2 x 14 3/16 in.)
Culture
France, 19th century
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art, Modern European Painting and Sculpture
Credit line
Bequest of Noah L. Butkin
Rights
Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
Who can see it
Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed

View at the Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

Gérôme spent the years 1843 and 1844 in Rome, where this work was painted. The woman's severe expression and drapery recall ancient Roman statuary as well as the 19th-century belief that the essence of the antique could still be found amid the ruins and people of contemporary Rome.