About this artwork
Holding a mirror, powdering her chest, and surrounded with accoutrements of fashion and beauty, the figure portrayed here does not necessarily inspire thoughts of youth and vibrancy. Rather, as one critic put it when this painting was first exhibited, he saw a “woman with flesh the color of a corpse drowned six weeks.” Ida Rogers herself was 19 years old at the time she posed for the artist. With his hyperbolic version of realism, Ivan Albright laboriously transformed his sitter into a vision of his own making. The painting is less a portrait than a meticulous musing on the passage of time and the relationship—both powerful and fragile—between mind and body.
-
Status
- On View, Gallery 262
-
Department
- Arts of the Americas
-
Artist
- Ivan Albright
-
Title
- Into the World There Came a Soul Called Ida
-
Place
- United States (Artist's nationality:)
-
Date
- 1929–1930
-
Medium
- Oil on canvas
-
Inscriptions
- Inscribed lower right: Ivan Le Lorraine Albright
-
Dimensions
- 142.9 × 119.2 cm (56 1/4 × 47 in.)
-
Credit Line
- Gift of Ivan Albright
-
Reference Number
- 1977.34
-
Copyright
- © The Art Institute of Chicago.
Extended information about this artwork
Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.