Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Plan your visit. 225 Madison Avenue at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016.

Study for the Head of the Poet in The Thorny Path

Thomas Couture
1815-1879

Study for the Head of the Poet in The Thorny Path

ca. 1873
15 1/8 x 11 5/8 inches (383 x 296 mm)
Black chalk on blue laid paper
2022.326

Gift of Karen B. Cohen.

Notes
In his 1873 painting "A Thorny Path," Couture skewered French society using the motif of a triumphal procession. A bare-breasted courtesan drives her chariot down a path lined with brambles; the vehicle is led by four captive men: a bacchic reveler, a dreamy young troubadour, a pensive poet, and a resigned soldier. An older woman sits in the back of the carriage, looking out at the viewer. The canvas in the Philadelphia Museum of Art is a metaphor for what the artist perceived as a decadent culture. While preparing the painting, the artist made several drawn studies and a compositional study in oils, now in the Musée des beaux-arts, Rennes. A drawing for the composition was sold in Paris in 1970.
The present study is for the figure third from left, the thoughtful poet wearing a hat strewn with laurel leaves, who writes in his notebook as he walks. His head and shoulders are visible between the arms of the troubadour and soldier. A similar large-scale study for the head of the bacchic reveler is in a private collection.
Associated names
Cohen, Karen B., former owner.
Classification
Century Drawings
School
Department