# Head of a Young Girl

**Lucia Fairchild Fuller** (born Boston, MA 1870-died Madison, WI 1924)  
ca. 1900  
watercolor on ivory  
sight 3 1/4 x 2 3/8 in. (8.3 x 5.9 cm) rectangle

Courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, 1929.6.46. [The museum's record](https://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=8718).

## About this work

The artist chose to place this unknown young lady against an “Oriental” background of tall grass, birds, and a large setting sun. The sitter’s vast puffed sleeves were known as gigot or leg-of-mutton sleeves, which grew to fantastic proportions during the last decade of the nineteenth century.

_Text from the Smithsonian American Art Museum._

Lucia Fairchild Fuller painted this in about 1900, aged 30. It is now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC.

### How it was made

- **Watercolour on ivory.** Thin sheets of ivory gave watercolour a luminous, skin-like glow, which made them the favourite support for portrait miniatures from the early 1700s.
- **Watercolour.** Pigment in gum arabic, thinned with water and laid in transparent washes. Nothing white is painted: the light is the paper showing through.

### [Lucia Fairchild Fuller](https://www.ochreeditions.com/artists/lucia-fairchild-fuller)

born Boston, MA 1870-died Madison, WI 1924

## Facts

- Type: Painting-Miniature
- The artist was 30
- Real size: about 3½ × 2½ in (8 × 6 cm). The original is small: even the 8 × 10 in print shows it larger than life.
- Century: 19th century
- Subjects: Women, Portraits
- Colour: grey
- Rights: public domain (CC0 1.0); free to use for any purpose.

## Get it

- Free download, full resolution: https://img.ochreeditions.com/m/1880.jpg?dl=1
- Image: https://img.ochreeditions.com/a/1880/1920.jpg
- Giclée reproduction on Hahnemühle Photo Rag: 8 × 10 in $28; 11 × 14 in $38; 12 × 16 in $42; 16 × 20 in $56
- Framed reproduction: 8 × 10 in $78; 11 × 14 in $98; 12 × 16 in $108; 16 × 20 in $138
- Canvas reproduction: 8 × 10 in $58; 11 × 14 in $72; 12 × 16 in $79
- Print-ready file: 8 × 10 in $2; 11 × 14 in $2; 12 × 16 in $3; 16 × 20 in $3

Sizes stop where the museum's file would print below 150 pixels per inch. Everything sold is a reproduction, made to order. [Order a print](https://www.ochreeditions.com/art/head-of-a-young-girl-si-saam-1929-6-46).