Black Woman with Peonies

Half-length portrait of woman arranging a vase of colourful flowers. Likely to have been painted in early1870, at which time Bazille had engaged 'une négresse superbe' as a model for three paintings which preoccupied him at the time: two of these works are in the Musée Fabre, Montpelier and the other in the National Gallery, Washington. This composition is closely related to the work of the same title at the Musée Fabre. He referred to his paintings on this theme simply as 'les fleurs', and seems to use the black model as a foil to the exuberance of the peonies and other flowers. Like his friends Renoir and Monet, and other late Impressionists, Bazille drew his subjects from modern life, rather than treat the historical subject-matter favoured by academic tradition.