Why the Long Face? Modigliani’s Seated Nude

Amedeo Modigliani is a popular modern painter and sculptor, beloved for his somber and contemplative figures with elongated necks. After moving to Paris from Italy as a young man in 1906, the artist ran in the bohemian circles surrounding Pablo Picasso and other international vanguards of the city’s Montparnasse neighborhood. At the time, much of France was still simmering from a racial and political controversy involving espionage and a state-sanctioned cover up. The event, known as the Dreyfus Affair, led to the false accusation of a Jewish captain of the French Army and splintered France along racial and political lines. As an Italian Sephardic Jew who was fluent in French, Modigliani could have disguised his identity to avoid antisemitic racism. Instead, he openly embraced his heritage. Adding to his outsider status was his renegade approach to art. Like Picasso and other modernists, Modigliani blended his semi-abstract compositions with references to the ancient non-Western arts of Egypt, Greece, and Africa and entangled his figural works in scandal by painting pubic hair onto his nudes. 

As if racism, poverty, the Spanish Flu, and the First World War didn’t provide enough adversity, Modigliani also suffered from pulmonary tuberculosis—a fatal and contagious lung condition—which he hid from his peers and lovers. A charismatic bon vivant likely avoiding social stigma, Modigliani recklessly disguised his symptoms by self-medicating with alcohol and drugs. It is no wonder that his quintessential long-faced, wan figures painted into empty interiors appear isolated and forlorn. The empty gaze of Seated Nude appears to harbor sad secrets, much like the artist himself. 

Shaping context around Modigliani’s art helps break the problematic tendency to romanticize male vanguards of history who have famously battled addiction, poverty, and mental illness. Behaviors resulting from such struggles have often been seen as excusable—even necessary—gateways to creativity and isolated artistic genius. From our Covid-enlightened perspective, perhaps we should re-examine these artists as multi-dimensional reflections of their eras and of deeper societal conflicts. Look, for example, at the current skyrocketing rise in mental health crises and substance abuse across all communities. As contemporary filmmaker Ken Burns captures in the title of his documentary on the youth mental illness epidemic, many today are “Hiding in Plain Sight,” much like Modigliani and countless others of his time.

—Catherine Whitney, Director of Curatorial Affairs 

Amedeo Modigliani (Italian, 1884–1920) 
Seated Nude, c. 1918 
Oil on canvas 
Gift of Mrs. Carter Galt, 1960 (2895.1)