Artist: French sculptor, 18th century
Origin: France
Date: 18th century
Material: marble
Dimensions: 65 × 40 cm
Current Collection: The State Hermitage Museum
Inventory Number: N.sk-1177
Hermitage ID: 58831
Rudanovsky Connection: Entered the Hermitage in 1920 from the collection of A. K. Rudanovsky.
A French marble bust of the eighteenth century, described in the museum record as a portrait of a young Nubian woman.
Portrait of a Nubian Young Woman. The State Hermitage Museum.
The bust entered the Hermitage in 1920 from the collection of A. K. Rudanovsky, through the State Museum Fund. It is not currently on permanent display.
It is a white marble bust of a young woman, her head tilted, wearing a headwrap with a flower and a string of pearls.
The Object
The bust shows a young woman from the chest up.
Her head is turned to her right and inclined, and her face is calm, with full lips, a broad nose and large eyes. She wears a twisted headwrap, decorated with a flower at the front, and a necklace of round beads.
A length of drapery crosses her shoulders and falls over the chest, leaving one breast bare.
The Sitter
The sitter’s identity is unknown.
She is described in the record as a «Nubian young woman», a term that reflects the European vocabulary of the eighteenth century rather than any documented origin. The bust may be a portrait of a real person, or a study of a type.
Her features are carefully observed: the sculptor has given her an individual face, not a generic one, and her expression is quiet and self-possessed.
The Headwrap
The headwrap is the bust’s most distinctive garment.
It is twisted and knotted, and it covers the hair, leaving the ear visible. A small flower is tucked into the front of the wrap.
Headwraps were worn by women of African descent in the eighteenth century, both in Europe and in the colonies, and they were also used in European sculpture to mark a subject as exotic or foreign.
The Necklace
A string of round beads encircles the neck.
It is carved in relief, and each bead is individually rounded. The necklace is a simple ornament, and it suggests a sitter who was dressed with care.
Jewellery of this kind appears in many eighteenth-century busts of Black subjects, and it is one of the details that give the figure dignity.
The Drapery
The drapery is classical in its forms.
It crosses the shoulders and falls over the chest in soft folds, and it is carved with attention to the weight of the cloth. The drapery is a European convention: it turns the bust into a classical image, and it connects the figure to the tradition of antique sculpture.
At the same time, the drapery is arranged to reveal the body, and its exposure is part of the object’s history and its effect.
French Eighteenth-Century Sculpture
The bust belongs to French sculpture of the eighteenth century.
French sculptors of the period produced portraits, allegories, garden figures and studies of heads. There was a fashion for expressive heads — the so-called têtes d’expression — and for figures of foreign or exotic types.
This bust belongs to that fashion, and it is also a portrait: a specific face, modelled with care.
The Label
The term «Nubian» is part of the object’s record.
In the eighteenth century, European artists and writers used «Nubian», «Ethiopian» and «Moor» loosely, to describe people of African descent. The terms were not neutral: they marked difference, and they were part of a culture that was built on slavery and colonial trade.
The bust should be seen in that context: a beautiful object, made in a society that was also a society of exploitation.
The Marble
The bust is carved in white marble.
Marble was the material of the finest sculpture, and it was used for portraits, allegories and garden figures. It is hard and translucent, and it takes a high polish.
The marble here is warm white, with a few veins, and its surface is smooth and slightly polished.
The Face
The face is the bust’s centre.
It is carved with care: full lips, a broad nose, wide eyes with heavy lids, smooth cheeks. The expression is calm and slightly withdrawn, and the head is tilted, as if she were listening.
The sculptor has given her an individual face, not a generic type, and that is what makes the bust a portrait rather than an ornament.
The Flower
A small flower sits at the front of the headwrap.
It is carved in relief, with a rounded centre and a few petals, and it is a small, cheerful detail in a serious face. The flower softens the image, and it suggests that the sitter was dressed for an occasion.
Flowers in the hair or on a headwrap were common in eighteenth-century portraits, and they were a sign of femininity and youth.
The Base
The bust rests on a small circular base.
It is a plain marble disc, and it supports the figure and turns the bust into a self-contained object. The base is slightly darker than the bust, and it has a few chips.
Bases of this kind were standard for busts of the period: they allowed the sculpture to stand on a pedestal or a shelf.
The Collector
The bust came to the Hermitage with the Rudanovsky collection.
Rudanovsky collected European art of many kinds, and his collection included sculpture as well as paintings, porcelain, glass and miniatures. Small busts like this one were part of his cabinet.
The bust is therefore a double document: of eighteenth-century French sculpture and of a Russian collector’s taste.
The Neck
The neck is long and smooth.
It rises from the shoulders to the head, and it is modelled with care: the muscles, the curve, the small hollow at the base. The necklace sits at the base of the neck, and it draws the eye to the throat.
The neck is a classical feature: in antique sculpture, a long neck was a sign of beauty, and it is one of the elements that give the bust its elegance.
The Shoulders
The shoulders are bare.
The drapery crosses the chest and leaves the shoulders exposed, and the marble is polished to suggest the skin. The shoulders are round and soft, and their curve gives the bust its feminine form.
The contrast between the bare shoulders and the heavy drapery is one of the bust’s visual pleasures.
Provenance
The bust carries the inventory number N.sk-1177 and entered the Hermitage in 1920 from the collection of A. K. Rudanovsky, through the State Museum Fund.
In the Hermitage
The bust is preserved in the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg and is not on permanent display.
It is a fine example of eighteenth-century French sculpture, and it is also a document: a face, a headwrap and a necklace, carved in marble, and a record that tells us less about her than we would like.
She looks out of the marble with a calm that is entirely her own, and she has outlasted the world that named her, and the names it gave her, one of which is still in the record, and none of which is the name she was born with.
