There is a man in the corridor, and he wants to see me dead.
- Poem by Modigliani

By spring of 1919, Paris had become safe again and Modigliani and Hébuterne returned to the city. The artist’s work was finally beginning to sell respectably. Jeanne Hébuterne was once again pregnant and settled with Modigliani in their first real home together, an apartment in Montparnasse. Unfortunately, Modigliani’s health continued to deteriorate, exacerbated by his drinking.

During the second week of January, Modigliani took to his bed, complaining of pain. A doctor was summoned and declared the situation hopeless, identifying the cause of Modigliani’s discomfort as tubercular meningitis in its final stages. Modigliani died on January 24, 1920, at the age of 35. Jeanne Hébuterne was inconsolable and, tragically, took her own life two days later.

All of Montparnasse turned out for Modigliani’s funeral. The same policemen who had arrested and harassed the artist on the streets during drunken revelry now stood at attention along the funeral route, leading Picasso to comment ironically “Do you see? Now he is avenged.” Looking back years later, many of his contemporaries expressed the feeling that an era had ended with Modigliani’s death, that Montparnasse had lost something rare and essential.

Accounts of Modigliani’s life abound with contradiction and exaggeration, much of it concocted years later by vague acquaintances with motives and agendas of their own. In the end, the art itself is the most reliable witness to Modigliani and the success of his youthful ambition to create his own truth of life, beauty and art.