After the Bath

After the Bath

After the Bath
Signed lower right J.L. Gérôme 1881
oil on canvas/huile sur toile
Size 32.5 x 26.25 in
Location:as of 2007 in Private Collection
French Orientalist


The Sotheby's catalogue 1999 description of this work notes the following about the women in the painting:

"Gérome chooses not to portray them in erotic or 'splendid' poses. Instead, he observes the movement of muscle and flesh as the body turns, and records the manner in which the light falls on the skin; for the artist, the human body itself was a thing of beauty. The structure of the bones, the mechanism of the musculature, and the flexibility of the skin were wonders, beauties of nature to be observed, studied and reported. Consequently, both he and his friend Edgar Degas sometimes placed their models into awkward positions to reveal, in full splendor, the anatomy of the human body."