Jean-Gabriel Domergue
1889-1962 | French

Beauty in a Boa

Signed "Jean Gabriel Domergue" (lower left)
Oil on canvas

Jean-Gabriel Domergue represents an elegantly seductive woman in this vibrantly hued oil portrait. Depicted with her hair tucked in a fashionable hat against a soft pastel-colored backdrop, his sitter embodies the youth, vitality and sophistication Domergue’s compositions are known for. Domergue's brushstrokes on the eponymous red and blue feather boa evoke a sense of movement as if a passing breeze caught the model by surprise. The woman is exceedingly poised, with a hand lightly draped across her chest, a heavy-lidded gaze and the slightest hint of a smile on her brightly rouged lips. The slender, modern woman of Beauty in a Boa exudes confidence and self-awareness, culminating in a perfect blend of prowess and elegance unique to Domergue's work that earned him the reputation of “inventor of the pin-up.”

Born in Bordeaux in 1889, Domergue studied at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts. He was only 17 years old when he exhibited at the Salon des Artistes Français for the first time, winning the Prix du Rome in 1911 and a gold medal in 1920. While landscapes dominated his early oeuvre, from the 1920s he changed his focus to what would become his trademark subject, la belle Parisienne. Domergue enjoyed a tremendously successful career. From 1955 until 1962 he was the curator of the Musée Jacquemart-André, organizing exhibitions of the works of van Gogh, Toulouse-Lautrec and Goya, among others. Domergue was appointed a Chevalier of the Légion d’Honneur and also served as a Fellow of the Academy of Fine Arts.

20th century