The Artist's Nephew, Prosper-Raymond de Fleury, Lying in Bed

In this portrait Albert Bartholomé captured his nephew’s facial features, hair, and nightshirt in a highly realistic manner. By contrast, the white bedding and acid green of the background are made in bold slashes of pastel, a versatile medium favored by the artist’s close friend Edgar Degas.

This drawing is among a small number of pastels Bartholomé made in the 1880s before his wife’s premature death in 1887 compelled him to work predominantly in funerary sculpture.