Page 26 - Orient Collection

7. The Noble lady visiting an Antique Shop

Artist: Georges CLAIRIN, French, (1843 - 1919)
Execution date (approximate): 1889
Téchnique: Oil on Canvas, (signed lower left)
Measures: 111 x 161 cm.
Description: The Noble Lady (Sarah Bernhardt) choosing a saddle at the antic shop with
her guard and greyhound dog. CLAIRIN is best known for his portraits of Sarah Bernhardt,
with whom he had a long friend ship, and he depicted in many of his paintings.

Exhibitions
De Delacroix A Kandinsky; L’orientalisme En Europe.
Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique 15.10.2010 - 09.01.2011.
Kunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung, München 28.01.2011 - 01.05.2011.
Musées des Beaux-Arts de Marseilles, 27.05.2011 - 28.08.2011.
(Reunion des Musées Nationaux de France, rmn)
- Harem Des Orient, Austria, Kunsthalle Krems, Krems-Stein, date: 14.08.2005 - 13.11.2005.

Publications
• L’Orientalisme En Europe, De Delacroix A Kandinsky, p. 307.
• Harem Des Orients, p. 87.

Biography
Clairin was apprenticed in the workshops of Isidore Pils and François-Édouard Picot. In
1861 he entered the École des beaux-arts de Paris, and in 1866 first displayed his work. He
travelled to Spain with Henri Regnault and to Italy with François Flameng and Jean-Léon
Gérôme. He met the Catalan painter Marià Fortuny in Morocco and they visited Tétouan
together. In 1895, he travelled to Egypt with the composer Camille Saint-Saëns. He is best
known for his portraits of Sarah Bernhardt, with whom he had a long friendship and whom
he depicted in costume for a number of her roles, including as the queen in Ruy Blas
(1879), Mélisande in La Princesse lointaine (1895 and 1899), Cleopatra (1900), Theodora
(1902) and Saint Teresa of Ávila; he also showed her in less formal poses. Clairin painted
many ceilings, among them the foyers of the Opéra Garnier (1874) and the Le Trident, the
theatre of Cherbourg.

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