Portrait of Fraulein Kyburz

Ferdinand Hodler's 1873 portrait of Fräulein Kyburz is an early work from the period when he was studying in Geneva under Barthélemy Menn, who introduced him to the ideas of Corot and the Barbizon painters. Hodler was then in his early twenties, a recent arrival from Bern working toward a career as a portraitist and genre painter before he developed the monumental Symbolist style for which he is best known. This early portrait documents his academic formation: careful tonal modelling, honest likeness, the sober approach of a young painter working to master the craft before departing from convention. The Rhode Island School of Design's holding preserves this evidence of Hodler's roots in the European academic tradition he would later transcend.

The portrait shows careful academic construction: the face is modeled with smooth tonal transitions, light falling from a defined source. The palette is restrained and warm, consistent with European academic training in the early 1870s. There is no hint yet of the flattened outlines and bold color of Hodler's mature Symbolist style.