Misia Godebska

Painted in 1908 and held at the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid, this portrait of Misia Godebska — later Misia Sert — captures one of the most remarkable women of the Parisian avant-garde at the height of her cultural influence. Misia was the muse and patron of composers, writers, and painters across five decades; she had been wife of Thadée Natanson (Vuillard's patron), then of Alfred Edwards, and would marry José Maria Sert. She is the subject of major portraits by Renoir, Vuillard, and Toulouse-Lautrec. Bonnard's portrait, more intimate than heroic, places her in his characteristic warm domestic-chromatic environment. The Thyssen's holding connects this to the history of Parisian cultural patronage.

The portrait is rendered with Bonnard's warm chromatic intelligence. Misia's figure is placed in a richly coloured interior setting. The handling combines the attentive characterisation of portraiture with the atmospheric colour of his domestic works, the sitter absorbed into a chromatic environment as much as formally posed.