Giacomo Grosso (Italian, 1860–1938) — La Nuda (Nuda), 1896. Oil on canvas, 205 × 104.9 cm. GAM — Civic Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art, Turin (inv. P/1148).
Shown at the Turin Triennale the year it was painted, this nude became known as La Nuda par excellence — the Nude, full stop. The title’s definite article was added because the painting was so famous that it needed no further qualification. In Turin, you didn’t ask for ‘the nude painting by Grosso’; you asked for La Nuda and everyone knew.
Grosso was the star of the Turin art scene, a portraitist who could make society ladies feel gorgeous and dead statesmen look dignified, but he never shied away from a beautiful model either. Here he gives us a woman lying on a huge animal pelt — thick, creamy fur rendered in swirling impasto — her dark hair flowing, her gaze direct, her mouth slightly parted. The brushwork is loose and confident, full of warmth: peachy skin against cream fur, deep brown hair, an almost golden light.
The composition is simple and elegant: one woman, one pelt, no props, no mythology, no excuses. Just a nude that doesn’t pretend to be about Venus or a nymph or a muse — the modern title La Nuda drops all the classical window dressing. This is a woman who exists in her own right, painted because she was beautiful and because Grosso could.
It’s also a reminder that fin-de-siècle Italy had its own answer to the French pompier tradition: less theatrical, warmer, more domestic. Grosso’s nude doesn’t strike a pose for the gods; she lounges like she owns the place. And at 205 cm tall, the painting is nearly life-size — she’s physically imposing in the gallery, the pelt spreading across the wall like a throne.
Fun fact: Grosso later became known for his portrait of the dead — he painted several funeral portraits of Italian aristocrats, capturing their faces one last time. From the Nude par excellence to posthumous portraits: the man had range. But La Nuda remains his masterpiece, the painting that made his name, still watching over Turin with that direct, unapologetic gaze.
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