Woman Portrait

Work presented at the exhibition 200 years of Quebec painting in 1969 at McGill University.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Clarence Gagnon traveled to Europe and pursued studies at the Académie Julian in Paris, under the direction of Jean-Paul Laurens, from 1904 to 1905. From the start of his career, he distinguished himself by winning a honorable mention at the Salon of the Society of French Artists in Paris in 1905. The painter will be recognized for his rural landscapes of Europe and Canada. He also produced several portraits of his wife and female models, around 1907, often in the form of pochades during days at the beach.

This work, created a year earlier during his apprenticeship year at the Academy, stands out from the pochades produced on the beaches of Dinard by its large size. The subject is presented in close-up, in profile, and framed by his parasol, thus recalling a theme dear to the impressionist painter Claude Monet a decade earlier. The woman's clothing reflects art nouveau trends, characteristic of the period, with a sinuous silhouette accentuated by a corset which imposes a marked arch. The dark parasol, decorated with floral patterns and Asian-inspired wooden details, is particularly fashionable on the streets of Paris. Japanese aesthetics, which caused a sensation among impressionist artists and within European society at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, were influenced by the arrival of the first prints from Japan in the West.

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