Collection Online
The pink rose
Medium
oil on canvas
Measurements
65.4 × 81.6 cm
Place/s of Execution
Auteuil, Paris, France
Inscription
inscribed in black paint l.r.: J.E Blanche (...illeg.) 0
Accession Number
2008.244
Department
International Painting
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Gift of Alice Vaughan, 2008
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of Digitisation Champion Ms Carol Grigor through Metal Manufactures Limited
Gallery location
19th Century European Paintings Gallery
Level 2, NGV International
About this work

The pink rose was exhibited at the New English Art Club in London in 1891, where it attracted the attention of the painter Walter Sickert, who wrote to Blanche that ‘To my mind it is the best executed work that I have seen by you’. The model was Lucie Esnault, the youngest daughter of a locksmith in Auteuil, who often posed for Blanche between 1885 and 1893. Lucie is depicted seated in the artist’s studio in Auteuil wearing the same black bonnet in which she appears in Blanche’s L’Hôte, a large and important Salon painting of 1892 now in the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen.

Subjects (general)
Human Figures
Subjects (specific)
dresses (garments) girls hats rose (genus) seated figures white (colour) youth (people)
Provenance
Exhibited, The New English Art Club, London, May 1891, no. 26, as The pink rose unknown private collection (Belgian nationality), by 1976 included in Christie's sale, London, 9 April 1976, no. 116 as Fillette en blanc, assise from where purchased Alice Vaughan her collection, Melbourne, 1976–2008 by whom gifted to the NGV, 2008.