The Artist’s Studio, Antwerp

Signed on the Lower Left, FD Millet.

This painting of Millet’s Antwerp Studio; sometimes listed as Antwerp Bedroom, is most often associated with his time while studying at the Royal Academy of Art in Antwerp, Belgium.  There have been a few listings that associate the painting with his apartment in Rome while painting there, but Antwerp is the consensus of Millet scholars.

This painting is listed by Childs Gallery,  in Boston, MA as being for sale with another item: “Sold as a pair with a drawing by Edwin Graves Champney of a Roman Bust of Emperor Vitellius. This same Roman Bust also appears in the background of this painting. Letters and a diary of Champney in the Archives of American Art show that the two artists were close friends and in the same Ancient Sculpture drawing class.”  The gallery also lists unspecified gallery labels on Verso.

In addition to seeing Millet’s Studio as a student in Antwerp 1872-73 it is interesting to see some of the same items in Millet’s East Bridgewater, MA, studio several years later, in 1876.  Such as the plaster cast of the man with his arm held above his head.

Other studio items can be seen in additional paintings, such as the round tilt top table which is in “Baby Worship” as the seat on which the baby is sitting