Guy Pène Du Bois

New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Annual Exhibition of Contemporary American Painting, 1951-52, no. 39

Toledo, Toledo Museum of Art, 39^th Annual Exhibition of Selected American Paintings, 1952, no. 136, illustrated

New York, Staten Island Museum, Guy Pene du Bois Retrospective, 1954, no. 31

New York, ACA Galleries, Acquisitions Including Avnet Collection, 1969, no. 4 (as Tri-cornered Hat)

Omaha, The Joslyn Art Museum, The Thirties Decade: American Artists and Their European Contemporaries, 1971, p. 23, no. 61, illustrated (as The Tricornered Hat)

East Hampton, Guild Hall, Artists and East Hampton: A One Hundred Year Perspective, 1976, p. 22 (as The Tricornered Hat)

According to Pene du Bois scholar Betsy Fahlman, the present work depicts the artist's daughter, Yvonne. Recognizable by her dark hair and fashionable mode of dress, Yvonne was one of her father's favorite subjects and appears frequently in his paintings. An artist herself, Yvonne is illustrated in a gallery setting to signify her status as a painter in her own right. Pene du Bois often produced interior scenes such as this one - experimenting with courtrooms, theaters, and cocktail parties as subject matter. The title, The Tricorne Hat, refers to the style of hat worn by Yvonne which first gained popularity in the eighteenth century. Since the artist illustrated numerous paintings of Yvonne, the title also intended to differentiate this work from other representations of the young woman. Yvonne and her father maintained a close relationship until his death in 1956, and this is one of only a handful of major paintings completed by Pene du Bois in the 1950s.