The Life of a Painting as Traced by Technical Analysis: Original Materials and Posthumous Alterations in Édouard Manet’s Woman in Striped Dress

Abstract

Among the holdings of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, New York, is a large-scale portrait by Édouard Manet that remained apparently unfinished upon the artist’s death, in April 1883. This work, now known as Woman in Striped Dress, belongs to Manet’s late artistic production and dates from around 1877 to 1880. A collaborative endeavor entailing archival research and scientific analysis revealed that the composition had suffered dramatic alterations prior to its arrival at the museum in 1965 as an extended loan, likely carried out to “finish” the picture in order that it would be marketable and to increase its sale value. Among the main changes explored in this technical study are the reductions in the canvas size and subsequent varnishing campaigns. Furthermore, along with a detailed characterization of the original materials present in the ground and paint layers, this research contributed to the identification of posthumous retouchings, possibly executed concurrently with trimming the canvas along both sides and at the top edge. The investigation was instrumental in devising an appropriate treatment to remove the discolored varnish and select areas of retouching, which obscured significant details of the composition and Manet’s delicate brushwork.