Art Institute of ChicagoPublic domain

Strange Flower (Little Sister of the Poor)

Odilon Redon · 1880

Provenance

Ownership history

Sold by the artist to Ambroise Vollard (1867-1939), Paris, December 30, 1897. Henri Petiet (1894-1980), Paris, 1940; sold to the Art Institute, 1950.

Recorded by Art Institute of Chicago.

Exhibitions

Exhibition history

The Art Institute of Chicago, " Unpublished Drawings for the Temptation of St. Anthony by Odilon Redon, lent by Jean Goriany, New York," July 26, 1941-April 30, 1942.
Paris, Salle du Journal, "Le Gallois," "Deuxième Exposition des dessins de M. Odilon Redon," 1882.
Paris, Musée des Arts Decoratifs, "Odilon Redon, Exposition Rétrospective de son oeuvre," March 1926, cat. 235.
New York, The Museum of Modern Art, "Redon, Drawings and Lithographs," 1952, cat. 7.
Palm Beach, Fla. Society of the Four Arts, "Odilon Redon," 1955, cat. 45.
New York, The Museum of Modern Art, "Odilon Redon, Gustave Moreau, Rodolphe Bresdin," December 4, 1961-February 4, 1962, cat. 107; traveled to The Art Institute of Chicago, March 2-April 15, 1962.
The Art Institute of Chicago, "Odilon Redon: Prince of Dreams," June 9-September 18, 1994, cat. 55, cat. by Douglas Druick et al; traveled to Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, October 20, 1994-January 15, 1995; and London, the Royal Academy of Arts, February 16-May 21, 1995.
Gifu, Japan, The Museum of Fine Arts, "Odilon Redon --Le souci de l'absolu (Search for the Absolute)," October 8, 2002-December 8, 2002, cat. 47; traveled to Shimane, Japan, Shimane Art Museum, August 2, 2002-September 23, 2002.
New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Art Institute of Chicago, "Cézanne to Picasso: Ambroise Vollard, Patron of the Avant-Garde," 2006-2007; shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, September 14, 2006-January 7, 2007, and The Art Institute of Chicago, February 17-May 13, 2007.
The Art Institute of Chicago, "Strange Realities: The Symbolist Imagination", October 4, 2025 - January 5, 2026.

Literature

Published references

Emile Hennequin, "Beaux Arts: Odilon Redon," La Revue Litteraire et Artistique (March 4, 1882), p. 137.
Joris Karl Huysmans, "Le Salon Officiel de 1881," and "Appendice," L'Art Moderne (Paris, 1883), p. 299.
Hugh Edwards, "Redon, Flaubert, Vollard," Bulletin of The Art Institute of Chicago, 36 (1942), p. 4 (ill.).
Roseline Bacou, Odilon Redon (Geneva, 1956), p. 70, note 3.
Klaus Berger, Odilon Redon, Fantasy and Colour, translated by Michael Bullock (New York, 1965 ), p. 224, no. 615.
The Art Institute of Chicago Quarterly, 55:5 (1961), (ill. on cover).
Igor Gazdik, Odilon Redon (Bratislava, 1971), no. 13 (ill.).
Jean Selz, Odilon Redon, translated by Eileen Hennessy (Naefels, 1978), p. 35 (ill.).
Harold Joachim and Sandra Haller Olsen, French Drawings and Sketchbooks of the Nineteenth Century (Chicago, 1979), p. 79, 4D11.
Diane Kelder, L'Heritage de L'Impressionisme (Paris, 1986), p. 121 (ill).
Jean Vialla, Odilon Redon (Paris, 1988), p. 82 (ill.).
Steven Frederick Eisenman, The Temptation of Saint Redon: Biography, Ideology, and Style in the Noirs of Odilon Redon (Chicago, 1992), p. 146, fig. 111.

Comparables