La prova dell'abito

In 1892 the Paris flat Vuillard shared with his mother was also her place of work. She was a corsetiere, and fabric, pins and half-made clothes were simply what those rooms held. For a long time this little panel was known as an actress in her dressing room. The museum in Reims reads it differently now. The woman being helped into her dress is the painter's sister Marie, at about the time she became engaged to his friend and fellow painter Ker-Xavier Roussel. Vuillard was 24, newly part of the Nabis circle working from Gauguin's example, and pushing to see how far a picture could go towards flat pattern. The reds of the screen behind and the dress in front sit so close that the two women nearly dissolve into the wall. He painted it on a piece of wood about 24 centimetres high.