A contemporary of Picasso and Matisse, Amedeo Modigliani created a style of portraits and nudes all his own

(L to R) Jeanne Hebuturne 1918 (pregnant); and Italian woman 1918-1919.

Content warning: This article contains mention of suicide.

The Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia looks like a squat concrete bunker with a windowless façade and tucked behind a promenade. Inside the toasty warmth of the building, the crowd is buzzing as the visitors walk towards the latest show: Modigliani Up Close. In celebration of its centennial, Barnes Foundation is presenting the major loan exhibition which has been curated by an international team of curators, art historians and conservators.

The expansive exhibition begins with a self-portrait (1919) of Amedeo Modigliani (1884-1920) which is considered as one of the last paintings made by the artist in Paris. The exhibition is significant for looking closely at the paintings with technical imaging and scientific analysis.

Since it focuses on how the artist made his works, we know the nature of the canvases that the artist used, if they were painted over, the drawing process below the layers of paint and so on. For instance, the self-portrait’s support was cut from a roll of primed canvas Modigliani used for two earlier works which meant that probably, his Parisian art dealer Leopold Zborowski provided the canvases whenever the artist needed them. But the grand visuals of the exhibition becomes more relevant when we try and understand the artist’s life.

Early Life

So, who exactly was Modigliani? The Italian-born artist was known for his portraits of people with unrealistically elongated necks and with a melancholic air. But that’s simplifying the master artist who trailblazed like a comet in his short life.

According to his mother Eugenia, Modigliani, born in 1884, was already dying as a teenager living in his hometown of Livorno, Tuscany, when he contracted tuberculosis at 16. Before that, he had pleurisy at 11 and typhoid at 14. Young Modigliani may have expected a premature death after having received the diagnosis of tuberculosis and could have probably tried to suppress the symptoms by having ‘little drinks at regular intervals’ as his daughter Jeanne suspected.

He moved to Paris and worked purposefully in spite of leading a self-indulgent life of lovers, alcohol and experimenting with drugs. But a lot of Modigliani’s fame and reputation comes from some of the works displayed in the show – the nudes.

Modigliani’s Nudes

At a time when there were conventions in painting nudes – no pubic hair to be depicted and the model’s eyes averted – here were Modigliani’s nudes having attributes of wildness and freedom. He drew sensual elements in detail, pubic hair was visible and what made the works unnerving were the empty-eyed models. His dealer and friend Leopold Zborowski was greatly impressed by the paintings or ‘merchandise’ as the artist referred to his works, and managed to get a one-man show at pioneering gallerist Berthe Weill’s gallery. Here, they displayed one of the nudes at the window before the show opening, hoping to attract some interest. It was more than they expected. Crowds gathered at the window, a policeman later ordered the defiant Weill to close down the show and when she resisted, took her to the police commissioner’s office and finally, reluctantly she had to close the doors and pull down the blinds of the window.

Thus, Modigliani’s first and only one-man show closed before being officially opened. Still, two drawings were sold and Weill herself bought five paintings. Not many takers were there for the nudes, which are now worth millions, and one of the collectors was believed to have said to Weill, ‘Where will I put those four nudes with all those triangles?’ It is apparent that Modigliani did not see his nudes as the indulgence of private fantasies and so did not see why they couldn’t be put on public display.

On display in a large gallery at the exhibition are some magnificent nudes, Nude (1917); Seated Nude with a Shirt (1917); Reclining Nude (1917); Reclining Nude (1919) – with a pearlescent quality of skin tone; Nude with a Coral Necklace (1917) – where the model has placed her hand lightly on her pubic hair; and Standing Nude (1918) of Elvira with whom Modigliani had ended an affair several years earlier. This painting has no background, giving Elvira a stone sculpture look.

Reclining nude (1919)

Modigliani’s Jeanne

There is a small portrait displayed of a seated girl visibly pregnant. That’s Jeanne Hebuterne, Seated (1918). Thread count analysis relates this painting to four others that Modigliani painted around 1918–19. Jeanne is  seated comfortably in her bedroom in the painting and was the common-law wife of the artist. She had met him as a student at Ecole des Arts Decoratifs and had impressed Modigliani with her fresh looks, intelligence, and common interest for music. They had kept their affair hidden from her parents and lived in poverty. She was his model for several paintings, and even though Modigliani could never be faithful to her, he allowed only her to bring him home from outside a bar after a night of drinking.

When Jeanne was 20, she got pregnant for the first time and they moved to the South of France, in a little village Cagnes-Sur-Mer, in the hope that Modigliani would have better luck there. Artist Leopold Survage suggested to Modigliani to paint landscapes instead, but he apparently replied that after painting portraits in Paris for 12 years, ‘I need a human being in front of me to paint because in a landscape there is nothing to express.’ Of course, he had painted Jeanne many times, through her two pregnancies, her emotions reflected in her eyes.

Meeting Renoir

At Cagnes-Sur-Mer, Modigliani visited a wheelchair-ridden Renoir who was in his late-70s. Renoir took down a few paintings for close study and apparently told Modigliani that ‘you must paint with joy, the joy with which you make love to a woman. Before I paint, I caress the buttocks for hours…’ Modigliani struck out, saying, ‘I don’t like buttocks’ and left. None of his nudes show off the buttocks. However, Zborowski couldn’t sell paintings to pay the rent of the villa where they were staying and the villa owner allowed them to leave after retaining their luggage. He let Modigliani take his paintings though and unsurprisingly, was furious when their prices rose.

Later Years

By 1919, Modigliani’s health deteriorated yet he continued drinking. The paintings of this period showed the artist at his most confident and reflected his slowly growing commercial success. But now, he was painting with tremendous physical effort. Someone described that ‘his shoulders heaved, he made grimaces and cried out, you couldn’t come near him’ while he worked. None of it showed in the paintings and it is impossible to imagine how his career would have grown if he had lived longer.

Till the end, Modigliani refused to see the doctors. When one was summoned, it was too late. He apparently told the doctor: I have only a little piece of brain left, I know this is the end, I have kissed my wife and we have agreed in eternal happiness. He died of tubercular meningitis. A distraught Jeanne went to her family home, laid down in her room and at dawn, threw herself out of the fifth-floor window, killing both herself and the unborn baby the very next day after Modigliani's death.

One of his earliest American collectors was Dr Albert Barnes who purchased many of the artist’s works through Modigliani’s onetime dealer Paul Guillaume. The foundation has 12 paintings, a sculpture and three works on paper.

Because Modigliani used to leave his works in places and go away to avoid paying rent, or give away works to pay his bills without proper documentation, several unauthenticated works are still around. His tragic life enhanced the value of his works, but in his lifetime, Modigliani painted true to his understanding of beauty.