A Young Woman of Trastevere (Romaine du Trastévère, 25 Ans)
European Art

A Young Woman of Trastevere (Romaine du Trastévère, 25 Ans)
Artwork Details
Artist/Maker
Charles Cordier
French, 1827–1905
French, 1827–1905
Date
ca. 1860
Medium
white marble on associated white, veined marble socle
Accession #
2011.168
Dimensions
53 1/2 inches
Location
On View - Stent Family Wing, Level 2, Gallery 207
Description
French sculptor Charles Henri Joseph Cordier was fascinated with combining ethnography and art to create harmonious examples of beauty. As chief sculptor of the Natural History Museum in Paris, Cordier went to Italy and Greece in 1858 to inspect marble for export and to portray the people he encountered.
This statue is the result of Cordier’s time in Trastevere (“across the Tiber”), one of Rome’s old and diverse neighborhoods. The fashionable young woman gazes over her shoulder, revealing intricately plaited hair adorned with a single comb.