{"data":{"id":"1430","type":"artwork","attributes":{"id":1430,"topgoose_id":14868,"portfolio_id":null,"tms_id":1430,"title":"Opera Box","display_artist_text":"Guy Pène Du Bois","display_date":"1926","accession_number":"31.184","dimensions":"Overall: 57 5/8 × 45 1/8 in. (146.4 × 114.6 cm)","medium":"Oil on linen","department":"collection","classification":"Paintings","credit_line":"Purchase","is_virtual":false,"is_portfolio":false,"portfolio_tms_id":null,"portfolio":null,"edition":null,"publication_info":"","description":"\u003cp\u003eGuy Pène Du Bois, \u003cem\u003eOpera Box\u003c/em\u003e, 1926. Oil on linen, overall: 57 5/8 × 45 1/8 in. (146.4 × 114.6 cm). Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; purchase 31.184. Courtesy the Estate of Guy Pene du Bois\u003c/p\u003e","object_label":"\u003cp\u003eGuy Pène du Bois was a satirist of New York and Parisian society in the tradition of the French nineteenth-century cartoonist and painter Honoré Daumier. One of his favorite settings was the opera, which he attended as a music critic for the \u003ci\u003eNew York American \u003c/i\u003eand as the guest of the Whitney Museum’s founder, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney. From his seat in the house, Pène du Bois studied the rich and the powerful; he then returned to his studio to paint what he had observed. \u003ci\u003eOpera Box\u003c/i\u003e is a subtle satire—a trenchant commentary on the drama that unfolds offstage, in the theater’s audience. It portrays a refined, statuesque woman looking down from an upper tier of the house; her expression is distant, self-absorbed, and impenetrable. The sole occupant of an opera box is lit as if on stage, and set against a dark, velvety backdrop. Although her regal demeanor masks any individual personality, it suggests that the woman knows—or hopes—that she is being watched.\u003c/p\u003e","ai_alt_text":"A woman in a white dress leans on a dark railing, gazing downward with a calm expression.","alt_text":null,"visual_description":null,"on_view":false,"created_at":"2017-08-30T17:22:51.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-02-06T12:01:03.853-05:00","images":[{"id":93332,"url":"https://whitneymedia.org/assets/artwork/1430/31_184_cropped.jpg"}]},"relationships":{"artists":{"data":[{"id":"383","type":"artist"}]}}}}