Modigliani exhibition at the Musée de l'Orangerie - our photos

When the visions of the artist and his art dealer meet... The Musée de l'Orangerie highlights the emblematic relationship between Amedeo Modigliani and Paul Guillaume, his art dealer, in an exhibition entitled Amedeo Modigliani. Un peintre et son marchand, from September 20, 2023 to January 15, 2024.

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The exhibition focuses on the influence of this friendship on the artist's career and how it shaped his work. After meeting Constantin Brancusi in 1909, Modigliani devoted himself to sculpture until 1914, when he returned to painting, focusing mainly on the human figure. It was in this context that Paul Guillaume encouraged Modigliani, renting him a studio in Montmartre and promoting his paintings in Parisian artistic and literary circles.

Paul Guillaume is said to have discovered Modigliani through the poet Max Jacob. Correspondence between the dealer and Guillaume Apollinaire, poet and art critic, suggests that Paul Guillaume became Modigliani' s dealer at this time. The artist immortalized his gallerist in several portraits painted and drawn between 1915 and 1916, testifying to the special relationship between the two men. Their shared interest in African art, literature and poetry also strengthened their friendship.

In all, over a hundred paintings, some fifty drawings and a dozen sculptures by Modigliani passed through Paul Guillaume's hands. This quantity reveals the dealer's involvement in promoting the artist and his personal taste for Modigliani's works. The exhibition features portraits of key figures from the Parisian period, unknown models and sets of portraits of the women who shared the painter's life.

In presenting these emblematic works, the exhibition also explores the Parisian artistic and literary context of the 1910s and Paul Guillaume 's role in the diffusion of Modigliani 's work on the art market in France and the United States in the 1920s.

The Musée de l'Orangerie also invites young visitors to discover the exhibition through activities based on the artist's works: magnets, spinning cube, drawing... There's plenty to keep youngsters busy and introduce them to art! And an opportunity to learn more about this artist and the world in which he evolved!