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Lady in Black with Spanish Scarf (O in Black with a Scarf)
1910
Robert Henri
A leading force in American realism, Robert Henri encour- aged his students and fellow Ashcan School artists to depict their lived experiences. The subject of this dramatic portrait is Henri’s wife, Marjorie Organ, an accomplished cartoonist who exhibited drawings at the 1913 New York International Exhibition of Modern Art, or Armory Show. As the painting’s title suggests, Henri referred to his beloved as simply “O.”
With her hip angled forward, O appears here as an irrepress- ible force, with the sensual contours of her silhouette emphasized by the lines of her uncorseted black dress. This portrait challenged the conventions of society portraiture; posing her against a dark background, the artist’s psycho- logical realism presents her as independent, confident, and self-possessed—the very model of the era’s “New Woman.”
- Artist
- Robert Henri
- Title
- Lady in Black with Spanish Scarf (O in Black with a Scarf)
- Date
- 1910
- Place of Creation
- United States
- Object Type
- Painting
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 77 1/4 x 37 in. (196.2 x 94 cm)
- Credit Line
- Museum purchase, gift of the M.H. de Young Museum Society from funds donated by the Charles E. Merrill Trust
- Accession Number
- 66.27
