Odalisques were slave women in an Eastern harem (cf. Decamps, 'An Odalisque', P666 and Müller, 'An Odalisque', P605). Bonington produced only a few, comparatively restrained, exercises in the erotic Orientalism favoured by his friends Delacroix and Jules-Robert Auguste in the mid-1820s (see also Bonington, 'The Arabian Nights', P657 and 'Odalisque in Red', P734).
1826
Watercolour and bodycolour with gum varnish on paper
15.5 x 17.4cm
P749
Images and text © Wallace Collection, 2017
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The Wallace Collection
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