Morisot, Berthe (1841-1895)
Hiver, Femme au manchon (Winter, Woman with a Muff)
1880
Oil on canvas, 74.93 × 61.6 cm
Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas
Along with its pendant, Summer, Winter depicts a fashionable Parisian woman who personifies a season. Morisot debuted the paintings together at the fifth Impressionist exhibition in 1880, where critics associated their pastel palettes and gracious subjects with the 18th-century Rococo tradition. While such paintings were often described as “the eighteenth century modernized,” Morisot’s images of the Parisienne—a popular figure type representing an elegant, upper-class Parisian woman—were considered utterly contemporary. For example, the critic Paul-Armand Silvestre raved about Winter, “with its figure, so courageously modern, of the Parisian woman braving the cold in her furs.” (DMA)
Compare:
Morisot, Berthe (1841-1895)
Jour d’été
c.1879
National Gallery, London