Portrait of Madeleine Bernard

Madeleine was a young sister of a painter, Emile Bernard. This work was painted in 1888 during Gauguin’s second visit to Pont-Aven. Gauguin duly fell in love with her. The young woman depicted in this canvas does not look like the angelic portraits painted by her brother. She seems older and her attitude is that of a woman daydreaming. Her hair worn up, her enigmatic gaze, her made-up eyes and the careful drawing of her lips all make her a thoroughly charming seductress. The portrait is set in the traditional way within a very sober décor. The illustration visible in the upper part of the picture, which was long attributed to Degas, is identified as a print by Forain titled At the Opera. On the back of the portrait, Gauguin painted La Rivière blanche/The White River, a landscape in a very different style which reveals the experiments being undertaken by the artist in the early summer of 1888, which would culminate in a far-reaching change to his art.