Model in Yellows

Alice Pike Barney's pastel study captures a seated figure in profile, rendered in warm yellows and blues against neutral ground. The artist's economical line work and chromatic intensity demonstrate the influence of Post-Impressionist color theory on early twentieth-century American figure drawing. Barney, a Cincinnati-born painter and patron of the arts, worked across portraiture and theatrical design, bringing modernist sensibilities to traditional studio practice. Handwritten notations on the sheet suggest preliminary study or artist's notation, a common practice in working drawings of the period.