How Much Is Woman at Her Toilette Worth?

Woman at Her Toilette is a canonical image in Berthe Morisot’s oeuvre and a touchstone for the Impressionist depiction of modern bourgeois femininity. The toilette theme—women at mirrors, dressing, or preparing—recurs throughout Morisot’s practice and is frequently reproduced in surveys of Impressionism. This specific work’s late‑1870s dating aligns with the movement’s core years and with Morisot’s most influential period. Its art-historical stature is amplified by extensive museum citation and exhibition visibility, situating it among the artist’s most recognized compositions. Works that both epitomize an artist’s contribution to a movement and encapsulate a signature motif tend to command premium valuations, especially when supported by scholarship and institutional endorsement.

Dated circa 1875–1880, the painting sits squarely in Morisot’s prime Impressionist years. The handling—luminous, high‑key color; rapid, flickering brushwork; and a confident balance of finish and spontaneity—exemplifies the traits most prized by collectors. Its mid‑size format (about 60.3 × 80.4 cm) is market‑friendly, offering presence without the practical constraints of very large canvases. In Morisot’s market, 1870s interiors and figure scenes with persuasive facture and atmosphere trade at a premium to later, sometimes more thinly painted or smaller oils. The combination of date, touch, and harmonious composition places Woman at Her Toilette in the artist’s top tier for quality, underpinning a valuation above most recent auction comparables.

The toilette is among Morisot’s most coveted subjects, uniting a modern, intimate interior with the nuanced psychology of a female sitter—an arena in which she was unmatched. This theme aligns directly with current collector preferences for female authorship, domestic modernity, and the interior as a site of innovation. Market evidence shows consistent demand for intimate figure subjects across Morisot’s career; when the subject is a defining motif executed at peak period, the price premium is pronounced. The image’s recognizability—regularly reproduced and cited—adds brand equity that translates into measurable bidding depth at the top end of the Impressionist category.

Long held by the Art Institute of Chicago (acquired 1924), Woman at Her Toilette benefits from the reputational halo of a major U.S. museum collection. The work has a prominent exhibition footprint, including the Impressionists’ 1880 exhibition and loans to significant retrospectives, most recently the 2025–26 Manet & Morisot presentation in San Francisco. Such institutional validation reduces buyer risk and increases perceived cultural capital, often lifting both auction and insurance valuations. While museums rarely sell, if responsibly deaccessioned with clean title and premier marketing, a picture of this stature typically attracts a global bidding pool and has the potential to set or test artist records.

Masterpiece‑level, late‑1870s Morisot oils seldom reach the market; many are institutionally held. Public results for later portraits and interiors have clustered around $0.8–3.5 million in recent years, whereas the record work Après le déjeuner achieved about $10.9 million in 2013 (mid‑teens in today’s dollars). A related “toilette” canvas offered by Sotheby’s in 2023 carried a $1.2–1.8 million estimate—indicative of demand for the theme, though later in date. The relative scarcity of prime‑period “toilette” subjects—combined with the current flight to quality in blue‑chip pre‑war categories—supports an estimate in the low‑ to mid‑teens for this museum‑grade example, with potential to eclipse Morisot’s standing public benchmark.