Portrait of Eugénie Estruc, called Nini

In November 1883 Pissarro's dealer, Paul Durand-Ruel, wrote to say he was sorry to leave him without a penny, because he had nothing at all himself. A month later, over Christmas, the painter had a houseguest. Eugénie Estruc, called Nini, the niece of his wife Julie, was staying with the family until New Year's Day, and on 28 December he told his eldest son Lucien that he had begun her portrait. He described it in the letter much as you see it, her somewhat sulky face under curly blond hair, a cherry-coloured bow, a dark blue ground. Getting it right, he admitted, had been hellish. He finished it in 1884. Nini, then about 20, turns up in several of his figure pictures of these years, among them The Pork Butcher, where she posed as the girl at the market stall. This portrait stayed in the Pissarro family until 1998, and the Glyptotek acquired it in 2001.