Modigliani - Woman with a Velvet Ribbon

This is Modigliani's Woman with a Velvet Ribbon, painted around 1915. A brown-haired woman wears a black velvet ribbon around her neck, and Modigliani renders her face with long, smooth lines that give it an almost sculptural quality.

Her pupil-less, almond-shaped eyes are a Modigliani signature, drawn from his interest in African masks and Oceanic art. The painting dates from his experimental period of 1914–1915, during which he used a "divisionist" technique—layering small dots and dabs of paint so that flecks of bare white canvas peek through, lending the colors an unusually vivid quality.

By contrast, the hair and velvet ribbon are painted solid black, making the face and background stand out all the more. Modigliani was shifting from sculpture to painting around this time and still developing his signature style, and this work shows how fully his sculptural training and his admiration for African art had already fused into it.