Portrait of Mademoiselle Chanel

Marie Laurencin

1923, oil on canvas, 92 x 73 cm

Musée de l'Orangerie, Paris, France

In 1923, the French artist Marie Laurencin (1883-1956) was working on the costumes and sets for Serge Diaghilev's Ballet Russes. When she met the fashion designer Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel, they were both designing costumes for the same company's Le Train Bleu. Laurencin was a well-known set designer when Chanel asked the artist to paint her portrait. The Chanel suit, which would forever alter the way women dress, was introduced to the public in 1923, the year Laurencin painted this portrait. Here, the couturier sits in a sensual, dreamy daze with her Pomeranian puppy in her lap.

Chanel is shown in an erotic state of undress, with one shoulder of her draped gown falling off her arm and exposing her chest. The soft, curving, fluid lines, smoky colors, and languid mood are typical of Laurencin's work. However, Chanel decided that the portrait did not look sufficiently like her and rejected it. It was then sold to the dealer and art collector Paul Guillaume. 

Chanele, if she refused a painting, she never refused herself in photography. She is the first, for example in 1937, who appears in an advertisement for her perfume Number 5, herself. This is a definitive point in the history of the status of the couturier. Chanel had the advantage of being quite beautiful and slender. She became her own role model, like the models that accompanied her.

There is a very tenacious feeling between what she wears, what she does and who she is.

In all the photographs you can see, whether it's Man Ray, Horst, Kollar, Hoyningen-Huene, that Chanel always wears make-up. Perhaps we can see the expression of this painting as a line of truth. Chanel had a blush on her face. She was like those ladies of the time who couldn't move without a fairly white make-up on their face. Without make-up that could sometimes be a little too intense. And at this point we can say that the work of Marie Laurencin speaks of the mask of Chanel. Has the artist revealed the side of the designer that she especially did not want to show to the public?