Marc Chagall Born Vitebsk (formerly Russian Empire, now Belarus), 1887; died Saint-Paul, France, 1985
Birth
1911/12
Marc Chagall's 'Birth' (1911) is an early canvas from the artist's first Paris years, transposing the iconography of the Nativity into a Vitebsk Russian-Jewish interior — a midwife stooping over a bed while villagers press at the window. Painted in the strong Fauve colour and deliberate 'primitive' geometry that introduced Chagall to avant-garde Paris, the oil is a cornerstone of the Art Institute of Chicago's early 20th-century holdings.
Exhibition Venue
Image source: Art Institute of Chicago