Jeanne Hébuterne

1918
Amedeo Modigliani (Italian, 1884–1920)
Oil on canvas
Norton Simon Art Foundation

With elongated proportions and mask-like faces, Modigliani’s mature portraits share an unsettling family likeness. The pictures he painted of one sitter, however, are distinguished by particular grace and reverence. Modigliani met Jeanne Hébuterne, an aspiring artist, in the summer of 1917; she fell passionately in love and, in November of the following year, bore him the daughter she may already have been carrying when she sat for this picture, assuming the pose of an Italian Renaissance Virgin Annunciate. Born in Italy, Modigliani had moved to Paris in 1906, immersing himself in the bohemian artistic communities of Montmartre and Montparnasse. He frequented Picasso’s studio, dabbled in Cubism, and developed an addiction to drugs and alcohol. By the time he met Hébuterne, he was already gravely ill but had evolved the distinctive style—influenced by Botticelli and the early Italian masters—deployed in this picture.

Seeking the Perfect Frame

How does a frame change the way we see a painting? Curator Gloria Williams Sander asks this question in an essay in Recollections: Stories from the Norton Simon Museum (2025), on the process of reframing Jeanne Hébuterne. Since its acquisition by Norton Simon in 1960, the painting had been exhibited in a 19th-century Rococo Revival frame—a historical mismatch with the simplicity and refinement of this work. In 1993, Sander located this scotia-style artist’s frame, which is contemporary with Amedeo Modigliani’s portrait; it fit the painting perfectly and complemented the work’s linear forms and flattened treatment of the subject. Curatorial staff continue to marvel over this perfect pairing of painting and frame, which highlights the sitter’s mysterious pale blue eyes.