Portrait de Madame Germaine Carco

Germaine Carco was the wife of Francis Carco, an important poet and literary figure of France in the early 20th Century. As a resident of Rue Bonaparte in the Latin Quarter, Derain was close with Carco and several other writers including Vincent Muselli, André Salmon and André Breton.

Madame Carco posed for Derain throughout his career. The most important of the works of Carco, Portrait of Madame Francis Carco, painted in 1923 is now in the collection of the Kunsthaus Museum in Zurich. In the earlier portraits, Carco is depicted through sensual brushwork and strong light. In the present study, the application of unmodulated areas of pure color reveals the influence of Cezanne in the artist's later period.