The Old Duchess
Luks’s bold paintings honor individuals from impoverished and immigrant communities, such as the "Old Duchess." Featured in the Eight exhibition in 1908, the painting still had the power to shock eight years later when an admirer of the artist described the subject as "an elderly hag with a distinguished bearing . . . who wore five or six dresses at once, on her head a shapeless yet attractive gear, and in her pocket she carried a fat roll of bills for purposes of dissipation, or bribery, or for bailing out some Tenderloin wreck."
Artwork Details
- Title: The Old Duchess
- Artist: George Luks (American, Williamsport, Pennsylvania 1866–1933 New York)
- Date: 1905
- Culture: American
- Medium: Oil on canvas
- Dimensions: 30 x 25 in. (76.2 x 63.5 cm)
- Credit Line: George A. Hearn Fund, 1921
- Object Number: 21.41.1
- Curatorial Department: The American Wing
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George Luks (American, Williamsport, Pennsylvania 1866–1933 New York)
ca. 1908–10
George Luks (American, Williamsport, Pennsylvania 1866–1933 New York)
ca. 1921
George Luks (American, Williamsport, Pennsylvania 1866–1933 New York)
ca. 1921
George Luks (American, Williamsport, Pennsylvania 1866–1933 New York)
ca. 1922
George Luks (American, Williamsport, Pennsylvania 1866–1933 New York)
ca. 1922
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