Woman by the Lamp

In 1890 Signac finished his portrait of the critic Felix Feneon, a large and deliberately theatrical canvas with Feneon in profile holding a cyclamen against a pinwheel of colour, under a title that runs to a full sentence. This little panel comes from the same year. It is about 26 centimetres tall, painted on wood, and the woman under the lamp is very probably Berthe Robles, who had been living with Signac for some years and married him in 1892. It was never for sale. The panel stayed in the studio, passed to Signac's daughter Ginette, and went to the French state in 1976 on the condition that she could keep it on her own wall for the rest of her life.