Portrait of Madame Cézanne with Loosened Hair

Hortense Fiquet, who became Cézanne's wife in 1886, sat for over forty portraits — one of the most sustained portraiture series in nineteenth-century art. This circa 1885 Philadelphia canvas with loosened hair is among the most intimate, showing her in a private, unguarded moment rather than the formal seated pose of most Hortense portraits. The loosened hair suggests a domestic interior setting, the sitter caught between formal arrangement and relaxed informality. Cézanne's portraits of Hortense were painted over decades and document both his developing style and their long, sometimes strained relationship; he used her as a model with the same detached persistence he brought to apples.

The loosened hair is rendered with varied strokes that capture its volume and movement, contrasting with the more firmly modeled face. Cézanne's characteristic parallel brushwork constructs the figure, and the warm tones of skin and hair are set against a cooler background. The painting shows his mature handling at its most psychologically observant.