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Portrait of Moïse Kisling

c. 1919-1920
Chaim Soutine (Russian (active France), 1893–1943)
Chaim Soutine moved to Paris in 1913 and worked in relative obscurity until 1923, when the noted American art collector Dr. Albert C. Barnes purchased fifty-two of his expressionist paintings for his foundation in Merion, Pennsylvania. Barnes was attracted to his thickly painted portraits and turbulent landscape paintings, and his unprecedented acquisition of almost the entire contents of the artist's studio meant that Soutine suddenly achieved fame and financial security after almost a decade of poverty and struggle for recognition. This portrait of the Polish-born artist Moïse Kisling is an incisive likeness of his close friend, although the energetic paint handling imbues the work with a startling expressionist force.

Object Details

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