Head of an Italian Woman, 1844

The print

Printed by theprintspace, the East London fine-art lab trusted by artists, galleries and museums. Each print is made to order on Hahnemühle Photo Rag, a heavyweight 308gsm paper made from 100% cotton, with a soft matte surface and a natural white tone, using archival pigment inks made to last for generations.

Photo Rag suits this painting especially well. Its matte cotton surface keeps the brilliant blue background deep and even, and lets the soft modelling of the face read like paint, not print.

Sizes available:

40×50cm, 16×20″, fine art print, open edition
60×80cm, 24×31″, fine art print, open edition

Safe, tracked delivery guaranteed worldwide, with sustainable packaging.

The story

Gérôme spent 1843 and 1844 in Rome. Like many artists of his day, he believed the spirit of the ancient world could still be found there, not only among the ruins but in the faces of ordinary Romans.

This young woman, with her severe expression, her wreath of leaves and her classical drapery, could almost be a statue come to life. The canvas is inscribed “1844, Roma”: an early, quiet glimpse of the painter who would go on to fill Paris with gladiators, harems and nudes.

In the decades that followed it passed between dealers in Paris, London and New York. It is now in the Cleveland Museum of Art.