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Jacob Epstein

British, born United States, 1880-1959

Senegalese Woman, 1921

bronze

Edition: probably 2/3

overall: 22 x 18 x 12 inches (55.88 x 45.72 x 30.48 cm)

Collection Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York

Gift of Seymour H. Knox, Sr.,1927

1927:33

More Details

Inscriptions

no inscriptions

Provenance

Ferargil Galleries, New York;
purchased from Ferargil Galleries by Albright Art Gallery, November 19, 1927

Class

Sculpture (visual work)

Work Type

Cast (sculpture)

This information may change due to ongoing research. Glossary of Terms

Jacob Epstein is considered a champion of modernist sculpture and lauded for his perceptive depictions of his subjects’ characters. In his 1940 autobiography, Epstein recounts how he was inspired by a young woman who passed him on the street one day. Attracted to her “delicate and aristocratic beauty,” he asked her to pose for him, and she agreed. Her name was Madeleine Bechet. At the same time, Epstein was reading a book by a French military officer with the same last name, who, shockingly, turned out to be Madeleine’s father. The story recounted the author’s rescue of a young Senegalese girl from a caravan of captured slaves.

Label from Picasso: The Artist and His Models, November 5, 2016–February 19, 2017