Amedeo Modigliani Oil Painting Reproductions

About Amedeo Modigliani

Amedeo Clemente Modigliani was an Italian painter and sculptor of the École de Paris who worked mainly in France. He is known for portraits and nudes in a modern style marked by a surreal elongation of faces, necks and figures. Those pictures were not received well during his lifetime, and only later became much sought after. He was born in 1884 and died in 1920, so all of Modigliani's work belongs to the early 20th century.

Modigliani was born and spent his youth in Italy, where he studied the art of antiquity and the Renaissance, and that training sits under even the flattest of the heads. In 1906 he moved to Paris for the first time and came into contact with the artists of the city's artistic community. By 1912 he was exhibiting highly stylised sculptures with the Cubists of the Section d'Or group at the Salon d'Automne, and the carved heads of that exhibition explain the necks and the narrow faces in the painting that followed. Modigliani painted people, one at a time, for most of his short working life, and many of the titles here carry the sitter's name.

Series and periods

Amedeo Modigliani worked sitter by sitter rather than in campaigns, so this collection reads best by who is in the picture.

• Jeanne Hébuterne: the sitter who returns most often in the late pictures, named in the titles themselves. Two of those canvases are here, one plain and one under a red shawl. Titles here: Portrait of Jeanne Hébuterne, Jeanne Hébuterne in Red Shawl.
• Lunia Czechowska: two portraits of the same sitter, one with a fan and one in a white blouse. Titles here: With a Fan, In a White Blouse.
• Named sitters of the Paris years: the friends and neighbours of the École de Paris, each one titled with a name rather than a subject. Beatrice Hastings and names like it are how the Paris years are catalogued. Titles here: Beatrice Hastings, Pierre Reverdy, Frans Hellens, Anna Zborowska, Madame Dorival.
• The nudes, listed as Nu: the second half of his reputation, the reclining and standing figures that our catalogue files under nude. Titles here: Standing Nude (Elvira), Sleeping Nude with Arms Open, Reclining Nude from the Back.
• Women, children and work: the mothers, the servants and the young sitters, painted with the same long faces as the named heads. They are the quietest part of the collection and the easiest to live with. Titles here: Motherhood, Gypsy Woman with a Baby, Young Servant Girl, Young Girl Seated, Girl in a Sailor's Blouse.

Most famous works

These are the titles people open most in this collection, ordered by the traffic each one draws and by what actually sells. Each one opens its own page, where you choose the size and decide on a frame, and each is painted new for the order.

• Standing Nude (Elvira): one of the nudes at the centre of his reputation, the figure drawn out long from shoulder to knee
• Seated Woman with Child (Motherhood): a mother and child seated square to the viewer, the two heads tipped together
• The Black Dress: a seated portrait in which the dress carries almost the whole picture and the face is narrowed to a mask
• Woman with a Fan (Lunia Czechowska): one of two pictures of Lunia Czechowska here, the fan held up beside the long neck
• Portrait of Lunia Czechowska in White Blouse: the same sitter in a white blouse, the head tilted the other way
• Portrait of Jeanne Hébuterne: the sitter named most often in his late titles, painted with the elongation of face and neck that defines the style
• Jeanne Hébuterne in Red Shawl: the same face above a red shawl, the colour doing the work of the background
• Beatrice Hastings: a named sitter of the Paris years, the portrait cut close around the head and shoulders
• The Mistress: a seated sitter in three quarter view, the eyes left as two flat almonds
• Anna Zborowska: a standing portrait, hands crossed low and the neck longer than the head
• Gypsy Woman with a Baby: a woman with a child on her arm, the pair set against a plain wall
• Girl in a Sailor's Blouse: a child in a striped blouse, the head set on the long neck of the late portraits
• Madame Dorival: a head and shoulders portrait, the sitter named in the title as the Paris portraits usually are
• Pierre Reverdy: one of the male portraits, the face built from a few flat planes
• Frans Hellens: another named man of the same years, seated and turned slightly away
• Portrait of a Woman with a White Collar: an unnamed sitter, the white collar holding the centre of the picture
• Portrait of a Polish Woman: a seated portrait, the head small on a long neck
• Sleeping Nude with Arms Open (Red Nude): a reclining figure asleep with both arms open, one of the red grounds
• Reclining Nude from the Back: the same subject seen from behind, the body running the width of the picture
• Young Servant Girl: a standing girl in an apron, painted with the same stretched proportions as the named sitters
• Young Girl Seated: a child sitting still for the painter, hands in her lap
• Red-Haired Young Man: a young man seen close up, the hair the one strong colour

Browse by subject

Modigliani's subjects run through other collections of ours, and each one is a different door into the same painter.

• Portrait paintings: 8,463 works, the genre whose intent is to represent a specific human subject, worked on commission for public and private persons or out of admiration for the sitter, and long kept as a state and family record. Portraits are half of Modigliani's reputation, and they sit with the rest of the genre here.
• Portraits of women: 9,375 canvases, Most of his named sitters are women, from Lunia Czechowska to Anna Zborowska, and they are filed here as well.
• Nude paintings: 299 titles, the tradition of visual art focused on the unclothed human figure, a preoccupation of Ancient Greek art that returned to a central position with the Renaissance. The other half of his reputation, the reclining and standing figures, filed here with the rest of the genre.
• Paintings of children: 2,170 pieces, The young sitters, the servant girl and the girl in the sailor's blouse, gathered with the other children of the catalogue.
• Portraits of men: 10,500 paintings, Pierre Reverdy, Frans Hellens and the red-haired young man, the male sitters in the collection.
• Expressionism: 1,070 works, the modernist movement that began in Northern Europe around 1900 and presents the world from a subjective point of view, distorting it for emotional effect to evoke a mood or an idea. Our catalogue files him next to it, and his own style is a modern one, with the faces and figures drawn out long.

The full list of painters we reproduce in oil is on the artist index.

How each reproduction is painted

Nothing here is stock. When you order, an artist paints that title in oil on canvas in the size you picked, layer by layer, and you see a photograph of the finished painting and approve it before it leaves the studio. Fine detail takes time, so a face worked to a mask is slower than a plain ground, and nothing leaves the studio before you have seen it in a photograph. Seven sizes are available and the frame is optional, so the same picture can be a small study by a desk or the one thing on a wall. Shipping is free worldwide and returns stay open for 90 days.

Frequently asked questions

Why are the faces and necks so long?

That elongation is the style itself. He is known for portraits and nude figures in a modern manner marked by a surreal stretching of faces, necks and figures, and by 1912 he was already exhibiting highly stylised sculptures, which is where those narrow heads come from.

Was Modigliani famous while he was alive?

No. The work was not received well during his lifetime and only later became much sought after, so Modigliani's place in modern art was settled after his death in 1920, not in his own time. He was born in 1884, which puts his death at the age of 35.

Did Modigliani make sculptures too?

Yes. By 1912 he was exhibiting highly stylised sculptures with the Cubists of the Section d'Or group at the Salon d'Automne, and he had studied the art of antiquity and the Renaissance in Italy before that. We reproduce the painting, not the sculptures, so what you see here are pictures for a wall.

Where did Modigliani work?

He was born and spent his youth in Italy, where he studied the art of antiquity and the Renaissance. In 1906 he moved to Paris, and as a painter of the École de Paris he worked mainly in France for the rest of his life. The sitters in these titles are the people he met there.

Which Modigliani should I start with?

If you want the picture that reads as his at a glance, take a named head such as Beatrice Hastings or Anna Zborowska. If you want colour on a wall, take the red shawl. If you want the nudes, start with the Standing Nude. A 20th century sitter looks at home on a plain wall, so most people hang one on its own.

Are these original Amedeo Modigliani paintings?

No. Each one is a new painting, made by hand in oil on canvas after Modigliani's composition. It is a reproduction, not a print, and not the original canvas.

What sizes and frames can I order?

Every Modigliani reproduction here comes in seven sizes, with an optional frame. You see a photo of the finished oil painting and approve it before it ships, worldwide shipping is free, and returns stay open for 90 days.