Fantin-Latour, Portrait of a Woman, 1885


Degas, Portrait of a Woman in Gray, 1865
Fantin-Latour gives us a more interesting woman, but Degas gives us the more interesting painting. Characterization is secondary, that would follow the logic of modernism. Or did Degas give both a richer material experience (and a richer depiction of material experience) and a richer characterization of a duller person?
Both paintings are in the collection of the Met. They hang side by side.