Amedeo Modigliani Seated Nude, ca. 1917

The female model leans against a chair in a plain interior which provides no distractions, allowing us to gaze at her beauty. The nude was Modigliani's main pictorial subject and this is considered to be one of his most beautiful portrayals. It is also one of his earliest works. The girl's submissive and serene expression gives the painting an erotic charge. The elongated, angular lines, and the almost sculptural quility of the sitter's face, are typical of the artist's work. Modigliani developed his own individual, restrained style of painting and was not closely affiliated to any movement although he was profoundly influenced by Cubism, African sculpture and the work of Cezanne. A painter and sculptor, Modigliani lived at an exhausting pace. Born in Italy, he went to Paris in 1906 and spent the rest of his short life there. When he died, aged 35, of tuberculosis, his beloved girl-friend Jeanne Hebuterne committed suicide.