Bonnard intime : Marthe at her toilette

Exhibition at the Bonnard Museum, Le Cannet, 27 June – 31 October 2026

Following in the footsteps of Edgar Degas, Pierre Bonnard (1867–1947) reinvented the depiction of women at their dressing tables – and of Marthe in particular – asserting his modernity with great force. For him, this subject raises pictorial questions of form and colour, space and memory, framing, the interplay of mirrors and gazes, inviting the intimate space of the bathroom to transform reality and reinvent itself within a magnified everyday life. The unique relationship that Bonnard maintained with Marthe throughout his life left its mark on his work, inevitably lending a distinctive and unique tone to his painting.

Published to mark the first exhibition devoted exclusively to this subject, this catalogue fosters fascinating dialogues between paintings, gouaches, watercolours, ink and pencil drawings, and photographs. Regarded as one of the greatest colourists of the 20th century, Bonnard, through his nudes at the washbasin, offers a vision of the world that is at once enchanted and disenchanted.