This arresting portrait by Italian American painter Luigi Lucioni shows Jared French, himself also an artist, who served as the model for the acrobat in Paul Cadmus’s Gilding the Acrobats. In 1930, when Lucioni painted this portrait, Cadmus and French were students together at New York’s Art Students League and had begun a relationship that would last for several years. Here, Lucioni highlights French’s handsome face by placing it against an off-white cloth in the background and evoking the different textures of skin and hair with finely rendered details. Coincidentally, Lucioni and French both died in 1988.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Jared French
Artist:Luigi Lucioni (American (born Italy) Malnate 1900–1988 New York, New York)
Date:1930
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:18 1/4 × 15 1/8 in. (46.4 × 38.4 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Arthur Hoppock Hearn Fund, 1994
Accession Number:1994.74
Inscription: Signed and dated (upper right): L. Lucioni 30
[Ferargil Galleries, New York, sold to Everett]; Josephine P. Everett, Pasadena, Calif. (by 1932–d. 1937; her bequest to Pasadena Art Institute); Pasadena Art Institute, later Pasadena Art Museum (1938–71); Robert B. Haas, Santa Cruz, Calif. (1971–93; sale, Butterfield & Butterfield, Los Angeles, June 16, 1993, no. 3188, as "Portrait of a Young Man," sold to Midtown Payson); [Midtown Payson Galleries, New York, 1993–94; sold to MMA]
New York. Ferargil Galleries. "Luigi Lucioni," January–February 1931, no. 6.
Boston. Casson Galleries. "Luigi Lucioni," October 1931, no. 16.
Andover, Mass. Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy. "Young American Artists: An Exhibition by Members of the Lewis Comfort Tiffany Foundation. Eighth Loan Exhibition," March 15–April 28, 1932, no. 24 (as "Portrait of a Young Man," lent by Mrs. Henry A. Everett).
Pasadena Art Institute. "Pasadena Portraits," October 1941, no catalogue.
Dana Point, Calif. Dana Point Art Gallery. "Pasadena Portraits," November 1941, no catalogue.
Laguna Beach Gallery. "Pasadena Portraits," December 1941, no catalogue.
Shelburne, Vt. Shelburne Museum. "Luigi Lucioni: Modern Light," June 25–October 16, 2022, unnumbered cat. (fig. 5).
Art News 29 (February 7, 1931), ill. p. 10, list it in the caption as "Portrait of a Man," currently on view in the artist's exhibition at the Ferargil Galleries.
"Art Museum Visitors Pick Portraits They Liked Best." Pasadena Post (October 29, 1941), p. 7.
Stuart P. Embury, M. D. The Art and Life of Luigi Lucioni: A Contribution Towards a Catalogue Raisonné. 2006, p. 111, no. 30.18, ill. p. 136, calls it "Portrait of a Young Man".
David Brody inLuigi Lucioni: Modern Light. Ed. Katie Wood Kirchhoff. Exh. cat., Shelburne Museum. Shelburne, Vt., 2022, pp. 65–66, 69, 72, fig. 5 (color).
Luigi Lucioni (American (born Italy) Malnate 1900–1988 New York, New York)
1953
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