{
"data": {
"id": 154283,
"accession_number": "1988.91",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Symbolic Head, c. 1890. Odilon Redon (French, 1840\u20131916). Oil on paper mounted on canvas; framed: 69 x 54.5 x 7.5 cm (27 3/16 x 21 7/16 x 2 15/16 in.); unframed: 53.3 x 38 cm (21 x 14 15/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of the Mildred Andrews Fund, 1988.91",
"current_location": null,
"title": "Symbolic Head",
"creation_date": "c. 1890",
"creation_date_earliest": 1885,
"creation_date_latest": 1895,
"artists_tags": [
"male"
],
"culture": [
"France, 19th century"
],
"technique": "oil on paper mounted on canvas",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Modern European Painting and Sculpture",
"collection": "Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960",
"type": "Painting",
"measurements": "Framed: 69 x 54.5 x 7.5 cm (27 3/16 x 21 7/16 x 2 15/16 in.); Unframed: 53.3 x 38 cm (21 x 14 15/16 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"framed": {
"height": 0.69,
"height_inch": 27,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.1875,
"width": 0.545,
"width_inch": 21,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.4375,
"depth": 0.075,
"depth_inch": 2,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.9375
},
"unframed": {
"height": 0.533,
"height_inch": 21,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.0,
"width": 0.38,
"width_inch": 14,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.9375
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [
{
"inscription": "Signed lower left: odilon redon\r\n\r\n",
"inscription_translation": null,
"inscription_remark": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 310246,
"title": "The Year in Review for 1988",
"description": "The Year in Review for 1988. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 1-May 14, 1989).",
"opening_date": "1989-03-01T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 215330,
"title": "Odilon Redon - Le souci de l'absolu (Search for the Absolute)",
"description": "Odilon Redon - Le souci de l'absolu (Search for the Absolute). Shimane Art Museum, Matsue-shi, Japan (August 2-September 23, 2002); Museum of Fine Arts, Gifu, Gifu City, Japan (organizer) (October 8-December 8, 2002).",
"opening_date": "2002-08-02T00:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "Les origines de l'art contemporain. H\u00f4tel de Ville de Rennes, Le Mans, France (1951).",
"opening_date": "1951-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "If Wishes Could Buy. Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD (1955).",
"opening_date": "1955-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "The Logic of Modern Art: An Exhibition Tracing the Evolution of Modern Painting from from C\u00e9zanne to 1960. Nelson Gallery and Atkins Museum, Kansas City, MO (1961).",
"opening_date": "1961-01-01T00:00:00"
},
{
"description": "Odilon Redon, Gustave Moreau, Rodolphe Bresdin. Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL (1961-62).",
"opening_date": "1961-01-01T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "Possibly Gustave Fayet [1865-1925], B\u00e9ziers",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"The Wildenstein catalogue raisonn\u00e9 of Redon\u2019s oeuvre lists \u201cGustave Fayet?\u201d as the first owner of the CMA picture. In 1980 Fayet, a painter who worked in a style similar to that of Redon, purchased the Abbe de Fontfroide, where he exhibited works from his collection, including Redon\u2019s Day and Night. The reasons for Wildenstein\u2019s uncertainty concerning Fayet are unknown: it may be because there was little or no evidence that the CMA painting was present in the Abbe de Fontfroide, even though other works by Redon were know to have been displayed, or because Jacques Dubourg purchased other works from Fayet\u2019s collection, but this possibility, too, was unsubstantiated.
"
],
"date": "Before 1925",
"sortorder": 1
},
{
"description": "(Jacques Dubourg [1897-1981], Paris, sold to Knoedler & Co.)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"Dubourg, an art dealer, sold the Redon to Knoedler & Co. on October 20, 1954. The circumstances of Dubourg\u2019s acquisition of the Redon are unknown. It is possible that like a Redon pastel currently in the MFA Boston (64.2206), Symbolic Head was purchased by Dubourg from Fayet\u2019s collection. The MFA pastel may have been sold by Fayet\u2019s son-in-law, Paul Bacou, directly to Dubourg, as that work was lent to an exhibition in 1938 by Bacou. He may have had it in his possession by 1951, when was listed as the lender of a painting titled \u201cJeune Homme en Buste\u201d to an exhibition at the H\u00f4tel de Ville de Rennes, Les origines de l'art contemporain. The dimensions of that work (51 x 39 cm) are very close to those of Symbolic Head (53 x 38 cm); however, the catalogue notes that it is signed in the lower right, while the Cleveland picture is signed in the lower left, although it possibly that this was recorded incorrectly.
"
],
"date": "Until 1954",
"sortorder": 2
},
{
"description": "(Knoedler & Co., New York, sold to Mildred Andrews Putnam)",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"Knoedler sold the Redon (stock number A5851) to Mildred Andrews Putnam on February 20, 1956.
"
],
"date": "1954-1956",
"sortorder": 3
},
{
"description": "Mildred Andrews Putnam [1890/92-1984], Cleveland, OH, by descent to her son, Peter Andrews Putnam",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1956-1984",
"sortorder": 4
},
{
"description": "Peter Andrews Putnam [1925-1987], Cleveland, OH, given to the Cleveland Museum of Art",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": [
"At the time of Putnam\u2019s death on December 7, 1987, the Redon, along with four other paintings and two drawings, had been on loan to CMA. After his death, these artworks were distributed from his estate and then given permanently to the Museum in the name of his mother\u2019s fund.
"
],
"date": "1984-1987",
"sortorder": 5
},
{
"description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": "1988-",
"sortorder": 6
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": "Symbolism was a reaction against Realism and Redon is one of the most important artists affiliated with this movement. The symbolist painters used mystical dreamlike images that were highly personal in their work.",
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "One of Redon\u2019s favorite themes was a head depicted in profile, sometimes separated from the body to symbolize the spirit released from the material world. It also suggests a metaphor for abandoning physical reality for the inner realm of dreams, fantasy, and poetic reverie. This painting conveys the idea of inward-turning vision by framing the head in a series of collapsing rectangles. Conservation analysis confirms that the figure is a woman wearing a helmet and holding a green staff in her right hand.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60476330"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1988.91-symbolic-head"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "d'Argencourt, Louise, Roger Diederen, and Alisa Luxenberg. European Paintings of the 19th Century. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Museum of Modern Art (New York, N.Y.). Odilon Redon, Gustave Moreau [and] Rodolphe Bresdin. Garden City, N.Y.: Distributed by Doubleday, 1961.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wildenstein, Alec, and Odilon Redon. Odilon Redon: catalogue raisonne\u0301 de l'oeuvre peint et dessine\u0301. Paris: Wildenstein Institute, 1992.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "d'Argencourt, Louise, Roger Diederen, and Alisa Luxenberg. European Paintings of the 19th Century. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1999.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Berger, Klaus. Odilon Redon: Fantasy and Colour. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1965.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wildenstein, Alec, and Odilon Redon. Odilon Redon: catalogue raisonne\u0301 de l'oeuvre peint et dessine\u0301. Paris: Wildenstein Institute, 1992.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Odilon Redon, Series IV Inventory Cards, M. Knoedler & Co. records, box 130, Getty Research Institute.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Odilon Redon, Series IV Inventory Cards, M. Knoedler & Co. records, box 167, Getty Research Institute.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Baltimore Museum of Art. If Wishes Could Buy: A Handlist of the Exhibition, October 4-November 6, 1955. Baltimore: Baltimore Museum of Art, 1955.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Odilon Redon, Series IV Inventory Cards, M. Knoedler & Co. records, box 130, Getty Research Institute.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Odilon Redon, Series IV Inventory Cards, M. Knoedler & Co. records, box 167, Getty Research Institute.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Odilon Redon, Series IV Inventory Cards, M. Knoedler & Co. records, box 157, Getty Research Institute.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wildenstein, Alec, and Odilon Redon. Odilon Redon: catalogue raisonne\u0301 de l'oeuvre peint et dessine\u0301. Paris: Wildenstein Institute, 1992.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Odilon Redon, Series IV Inventory Cards, M. Knoedler & Co. records, box 167, Getty Research Institute",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Odilon Redon, Series IV Inventory Cards, M. Knoedler & Co. records, box 157, Getty Research Institute.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wildenstein, Alec, and Odilon Redon. Odilon Redon: cata",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Berger, Klaus. Odilon Redon: Fantasy and Colour. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 1965.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: no. 82",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wadsworth Atheneum, and Franklin Westcott Robinson. One Hundred Master Drawings from New England Private Collections: [Exhibition] Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Conn., Sept. 5-Oct. 14, 1973 : Hopkins Center Art Galleries, Dartmouth College, Oct. 26-Dec. 3, 1973 : Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Mass., Dec. 14, 1973-Jan. 25, 1974. Hanover, N.H.: Distributed by University Press of New England, 1973.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 140",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Turner, Evan H. \"The Year in Review for 1988.\" The Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art LXXVI, no. 2 (February, 1989):30-75.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 63; Mentioned: p. 70, no. 97",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Wildenstein, Alec. Odilon Redon: catalogue raisonne\u0301 de l'oeuvre peint et dessine\u0301. Paris, France: Wildenstein Institute, 1992.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: no. 348, vol. I",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Chong, Alan. European & American Painting in the Cleveland Museum of Art: A Summary Catalogue. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1993.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 190",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Druick, Douglas W. Odilon Redon: Prince of Dreams, 1840-1916. Chicago, IL: Art Institute of Chicago, 1994.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "D' Argencourt, Louise, and Roger Diederen. Catalogue of Paintings. Pt. 4. European Paintings of the 19th Century. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1974.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: v. 2, p. 515-517",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Yamamoto, Atsuko, and Noriko Tsutatani. Rudon ten: zettai no tankyu\u0304 = Odilon Redon : le souci de l'absolu. Japan: Chunichi Shimbun, 2002.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 102; Mentioned p. 102-103",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Arendsee, M., and M. Steinman-Arendsee. \"Take the CAN disability aesthetics tour, at the Cleveland Museum of art.\" CAN Journal (Winter 2019/20): 76-87.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 82; Reproduced: p. 83",
"url": null
}
],
"url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1988.91",
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"alternate_images": [],
"creditline": "Gift of the Mildred Andrews Fund",
"image_credit": null,
"sketchfab_id": null,
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"gallery_donor_text": null,
"athena_id": 154283,
"creators": [
{
"id": 1748,
"description": "Odilon Redon (French, 1840\u20131916)",
"extent": null,
"qualifier": null,
"role": "artist",
"biography": "A leader of the symbolist movement in France, Odilon Redon was born in Bordeaux in 1840 and grew up in the surrounding region. During his early years he studied drawing, architecture, and the violin. A friendship with Armand Clavaud, a local botanist and philosopher, stimulated Redon's passion for romantic art and literature. In 1864, after a brief and discouraging period of instruction with G\u00e9r\u00f4me in Paris, Redon returned to Bordeaux, where he studied printmaking with Rodolphe Bresdin (1825-1885). Deploring the emphasis on rational, phenomenal experience in academic and naturalist art, Redon turned for inspiration to the imaginative paintings of Delacroix, the prints of Francisco Jos\u00e9 de Goya (1746-1828), and the poetry of Charles Baudelaire. In 1870, after military service in the Franco-Prussian War, Redon settled in Paris and produced his first Noirs. These visionary images, featuring floating eyes and severed heads born aloft on wings, reflect Redon's belief in the superiority of the imagination and fantasy, which he considered \"the messenger of the unconscious.\" After producing his initial Noirs in charcoal, Redon discovered a method of transferring his drawings to lithography in 1876. Throughout the 1880s he continued to use charcoal, etching, and lithography as his primary media, and he produced twelve lithography albums before abandoning the genre in the late 1890s. During the 1880s Redon emerged as a leader of the symbolist reaction against impressionism. The publication in 1879 of his first lithographic album, Dans le r\u00eave, followed by his first solo exhibition in 1881, attracted the admiration of J. K. Huysmans, who included illustrations by Redon in his novel \u00c0 rebours (1884). Around the same time, Redon developed a personal and artistic relationship with poet St\u00e9phane Mallarm\u00e9. Increasingly drawn into the public arena, Redon helped organize the Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 des Artistes Ind\u00e9pendants in 1884. In 1886 he participated in the last impressionist exhibition and began showing with Les XX in Brussels. Redon's antinaturalist, visionary, art inspired many symbolist and Nabi artists, including Gauguin and Vuillard. Maurice Denis praised Redon as \"our Mallarm\u00e9,\" and in 1892 critic Albert Aurier described Redon as a leader of the new \"idealistic\" tendency in art. After 1890 the focus of Redon's activity shifted from monochromatic drawings and prints toward exploring color in richly worked pastels. His innovations in luminous color, as seen in the pastel and oil paintings he exhibited at the Galeries Durand-Ruel in 1900 were greatly admired by Henri Matisse (1869-1954) and the Fauves. Awarded the Legion of Honor in 1903, Redon continued his leadership role in the avant-garde and in 1904 became a founding member of the Salon d'Automne. In 1913 forty of his works were selected for exhibition in the Armory Show, the most by any artist. Redon died at his home in Paris in the summer of 1916.",
"name_in_original_language": null,
"birth_year": "1840",
"death_year": "1916",
"use_in_caption": true,
"include_extent": false,
"weight": 1
}
],
"legal_status": "accessioned",
"accession_date": "1988-09-22T00:00:00",
"sortable_date": 1885,
"date_added_to_oa": null,
"date_text": "c. 1890",
"collapse_artists": false,
"on_loan": false,
"recently_acquired": false,
"record_type": "object",
"conservation_statement": null,
"has_conservation_images": false,
"cover_accession_number": null,
"is_nazi_era_provenance": true,
"impression": null,
"alternate_titles": [],
"is_highlight": false,
"updated_at": "2026-09-15 11:13:05.761000"
}
}