Baigneuse aux bras levés

The theme of the bather fixing her hair is a timeless subject which has occupied artists for centuries, both male and female, including Edgar Degas, Puvis de Chavannes, Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and of course Maillol. Inspiration often came from paintings by earlier masters on this theme, such as Titian's La femme au miroir in the Louvre, or Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres' Le bain turc, which was widely published before it was sold to the Louvre in 1911. Many artists were also familiar with Japanese prints showing women of the pleasure-houses of old Edo (Tokyo) engaged in brushing their hair. Richard Kendall has observed, “the act of combing, brushing or attending to the hair is one of the most banal and wearisome of daily routines, associated with personal hygiene as much as glamour from the beginning of history. In Degas's day such rituals were still doubly oppressive for women, whose hair was typically kept long, yet was endlessly lifted and coiled, pinned and often kept out of sight for work or public presentation” (Degas: Beyond Impressionism, exh. cat., The National Gallery, London, 1996, p. 219). A woman's long hair has been a nearly universal fetishistic object of male attention, and the intimate feminine ritual of hair-brushing, usually practiced out-of-sight from a man's gaze, carried strong sensual and erotic connotations.
Maillol was fascinated by the subject, and executed multiple works on this theme. The figure of Baigneuse debout se coiffant appeared in his oeuvre as early as 1898, not long after he turned his attention from tapestries—for which he had gained recognition in the early 1890s—to sculpture. During the late 1920s, Maillol was asked to create another version of the sculpture by the famous Danish patron Johannes Rump, whose collection (including the Maillol) would later form part of Copenhagen's Statens Museum for Kunst. Following this commission, and its success, Maillol chose to enlarge the motif. One of these larger examples of Baigneuse debout se coiffant is among the statuary displayed in the Tuileries Gardens in Paris. Conceived in 1930, Baigneuse aux bras levés marks Maillol’s later return to the subject, reflecting its enduring popularity as much as its personal significance to the artist.