Francesca Woodman 1958-1981

Acquired by the present owner from a relative of the photographer, 1985

Other prints of this image:

Francesca Woodman Photographic Works (Shedhalle Zürich, in conjunction with the exhibition, 1992), p. 63

Francesca Woodman (Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain, Paris, in conjunction with the exhibition, 1998), p. 105

In 1977, nineteen-year-old Francesca Woodman arrived in Rome to study for a year in the Rhode Island School of Design's honors program.  Italy was familiar to her, as her family had lived in Florence in the 1960s, and she had subsequently spent several summers there.  By all accounts Woodman flourished, as Elizabeth Janus writes, '. . . she moved easily throughout Rome, constantly absorbing its energy, its visual splendors and contrasts, and particularly its quality of light. . . she had found an environment--one of history, of classicism, of sensuality, and of decay--that seemed to have been well suited to her artistic sensibility' (Fondation Cartier, p. 26).

The photograph offered here is one of five images comprising the series Self-Deceit.  This series represents the culmination of her self-portraits, begun in Providence, made in interiors in states of decay or disarray.  The images in Self-Deceit were made in the basement of Palazzo Cenci, RISD's 15th-century building housing the school.

Lifetime prints by Francesca Woodman, who committed suicide in 1981 at the age of twenty-three, are scarce.  It is believed that this is one of only 6 vintage prints of the image extant.