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Euretta Rathbone
Max Beckmann (German, 1884–1950)
German
1947
Medium/Technique
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
Overall: 94.5 × 78.4 cm (37 3/16 × 30 7/8 in.)
Framed: 113 × 97.2 cm (44 1/2 × 38 1/4 in.)
Framed: 113 × 97.2 cm (44 1/2 × 38 1/4 in.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase with funds donated anonymously and partial gift of Eliza Euretta Rathbone
Accession Number2018.2107
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsPaintings
In 1937, faced with mounting threats from the Nazis—who considered his modern, graphic painting style “degenerate”—Beckmann fled Berlin for Amsterdam. During the decade he spent there, he was visited by Euretta Rathbone and her husband, Perry who later served as the director of the MFA. BY 1947 Beckmann had settled in St. Louis and was a frequent dinner guest at the Rathbone home. Euretta’s husband commissioned this likeness of “Rettles”, as she was known to friends and to the artist; it was the first portrait Beckmann completed after immigrating to the United States.
Marks
Signed upper right: Beckmann S.L. 47
Provenance1947, acquired from the artist by Perry Rathbone (b. 1911 – d. 2000) and his wife, Euretta de Cosson Rathbone (the sitter; b. 1909 – d. 2003), St. Louis, MO and Cambridge, MA; 1993, gift of Euretta Rathbone to her daughter, Eliza Rathbone; 2018, sold by Eliza Rathbone to the MFA. (Accession Date: September 26, 2018)