Femme nue (tude avec drap)

Classical and romantic references are subtly fused in Moreau's homage to the antique. If his seminal reference for this study is the sinuous chiasmo of the Venus di Milo, this quote is filtered through the lessons of Ingres' icons of classicism: the figura serpentinata of Angelica in Roger Freeing Angelica (Muse du Louvre, Paris, 1819) and the Parnassian silhouette of La Source (fig. 1, Muse d'Orsay, Paris, 1856).