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Return of Spring
William-Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825–1905)
Title
Return of Spring
Artist
William-Adolphe Bouguereau (French, 1825–1905)
Date
1886
Medium
oil on canvas
Dimensions
84 1/2 × 50 in. (214.6 × 127 cm)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Gift of Francis T. B. Martin
Object Number
1951.889
On View
On view
Provenance
Sold to an anonymous collector and purchased back by Boussod, Valadon & Cie, 1886;
Purchased from Boussod, Valadon & Cie by Arthur Tooth & Sons, London, May 20, 1901 [1];
Purchased from Arthur Tooth & Sons by George Washington Lininger (1834–1907), Omaha, 1901–June 9, 1907;
Inherited by his wife, Caroline M. Lininger (née Newman, d. 1927), Omaha, June 9, 1907–1927;
Purchased at the Lininger estate sale, Lininger Gallery Sale, July 17–19, 1927, Omaha, by Charles W. Martin (1863–1944), Omaha, 1927–November 27, 1940;
His gift to his nephew, Francis T. B. Martin (1904–1995), Omaha, November 27, 1940–1951;
His gift to Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, Nebraska, 1951.
[1] An alternate Boussod, Valadon & Cie entry as stock book no. 17748 lists February 16, 1886 as the purchase date from Bouguereau and June 3, 1902 as the sale date to Arthur Tooth & Sons.
Exhibition History
Salon, Paris, 1886, no. 306.
Omaha Art Exhibition Associated First Annual Exhibition, 1890, no. 198.
Joslyn Memorial, Omaha, January 8–March 12, 1934, lent by Charles W. Martin.
William Bouguereau, 1825–1905, Musée du Petit-Palais, Paris, February 9–May 6, 1984; Musée des Beaux-Arts, Montreal, June 22–September 23, 1984; Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, CT, October 27, 1984–January 13, 1985, no. 113.
Claude Monet: Felder in Frühling/Fields in Spring, Straatsgalerie, Stuttgart, Germany, May 20–September 9, 2006, no. 42.
Bouguereau & America, Milwaukee Art Museum, February 15–May 12, 2019; Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, TN, June 22–September 22, 2019; San Diego Museum of Art, November 9, 2019–August 2, 2020, no. 33.
Titian to Monet: European Paintings from Joslyn Art Museum, Taubman Museum of Art, Roanoke, VA, October 14, 2022–January 8, 2023; Rembrandt to Monet: 500 Years of European Painting from Joslyn Art Museum, Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK, February 22–May 28, 2023.
Published References
Georges Lafenestre, “Le Salon de 1886,” Revue des deux mondes (May–June 1886): 595.
Omaha Art Exhibition Association First Annual Exhibition 1890 (1890), 9.
“With an Assassin’s Hand,” Omaha Daily Bee, December 16, 1890.
Clarence Lansin, The Nude in Art: A Collection of Reproductions in Photogravure of Celebrated Paintings by the World’s Greatest Masters, vol. 2 (Boston: Haskell Publishing Co., 1893), pl. 4.
Charles Franquet Franqueville, Le premier siècle de l’Institut de France (Paris: J. Rothschild, 1895), 370.
Marius Vachon, W. Bouguereau (Paris: A. Lahure, 1900), 156.
Current Literature 39 (1905): 391.
“The Art of William Bouguereau,” Brush and Pencil (Spring 1905): 86.
Catalogue of the Lininger Art Gallery (Omaha, 1907), no. 204.
Catalogue of the Lininger Art Gallery (Omaha, 1909), no. 204.
Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th ed., 29 vols. (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1910), 4: 317, s.v. “Bouguereau.”
“Man Facing Art Damage Charge,” Omaha World-Herald, January 12, 1976, 4, (repro.).
H. H. Arnason, History of Modern Art (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1977), 22, (repro.).
William Bouguereau, 1825–1905, exh. cat. (Paris: Musée du Petit-Palais, 1984), 233–34, (repro.).
Yann Le Pichon, L’erotisme des chers Mâitres (Paris: Denoël, 1986).
Holliday T. Day and Hollister Sturges, eds., Joslyn Art Museum: Paintings & Sculpture from the European & American Collections (Omaha: Joslyn Art Museum, 1987), 87–90, (repro.).
Peter Brooks, “Le corps-récit, ou Nana enfin dévoilée” Romantisme 69 (1989): 83, (repro.).
Peter Brooks, “Storied Bodies, or Nana at Last Unveil’d,” Critical Inquiry, 16, no. 1 (Autumn 1989), 24, 26, (repro.).
Mark Steven Walker, “Summary Catalogue of the Paintings,” in William-Adolphe Bougureau: L’Art Pompier (New York: Borghi & Co., 1991), 72.
Robert Atkins, Art Spoke (New York: Abbeville Press, 1993), 46, (repro.).
Peter Brooks, Body Work: Objects of Desire in Modern Narrative (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), 145–48, (repro.).
Graham W. J. Beal et. al., Fifty Favorites from Joslyn Art Museum (Omaha: Joslyn Art Museum, 1994), 76–77, (repro.).
Fronia E. Wissman, Bouguereau (San Francisco: Pomegranate Artbooks, 1996), 94, (repro.).
James F. Peck, ed., In the Studios of Paris: William Bouguereau and His American Students, exh. cat. (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006), 26.
Christian von Holst and Christofer Conrad, Claude Monet: Felder in Frühling/Fields in Spring, exh. cat. (Stuttgart, Germany: Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, 2006), 19, (repro.).
Damien Bartoli and Frederick Ross, William Bouguereau: Catalogue Raisonné of His Painted Work, vol. 2 (New York: New York Antique Collectors’ Club, 2010), 235.
Damien Bartoli and Frederick Ross, William Bouguereau: His Life and Works, vol. 1 (New York: New York Antique Collectors’ Club, 2014), 235, no. 1886/01, (repro.).
Tanya Paul and Stanton Thomas, eds., Bougueareau & America, exh. cat. (New Haven, CT and London: Yale University Press, 2019), 152–153, (repro.).
Taylor J. Acosta, European Paintings and Sculpture from Joslyn Art Museum (Omaha: Joslyn Art Museum, 2020), 15–16, 202–205, (repro.).
Veronica Cerbone, “Cosa c'è oltre l'immagine? – Indagine sulla tecnica pittorica di William-Adolphe Bouguereau,” (master’s thesis, Sapienza Università di Roma, 2024), 257–259, (repro.).
