Lot 163
Lot 163
ÉCOLE FRANÇAISE VERS 1800

Portrait d'une dessinatrice assise dans un paysage

Price Realised EUR 30,240
Estimate
EUR 10,000 - EUR 15,000
Closed: 12 Jun 2025
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ÉCOLE FRANÇAISE VERS 1800

Portrait d'une dessinatrice assise dans un paysage

Price Realised EUR 30,240
Closed: 12 Jun 2025
Price Realised EUR 30,240
Closed: 12 Jun 2025
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Details
ÉCOLE FRANÇAISE VERS 1800
Portrait d'une dessinatrice assise dans un paysage
huile sur toile
100 x 81,2 cm (3913 x 32 in.)
Provenance
Vente anonyme, Exper Antic, Barcelone, 1er février 2025, lot 48 (sans attribution).
FURTHER DETAILS
FRENCH SCHOOL CIRCA 1800, PORTRAIT OF A DRAUGHTSWOMAN SEATED IN A LANDSCAPE, OIL ON CANVAS

From the 1770s onwards, young women had much greater access to the arts, and an artistic practice was truly seen as a career. Leading artists such as Greuze (1725-1805), David (1748-1825) and Suvée (1743-1807) opened studios for what were known as “demoiselles”, and the status of free artist (i.e. one who could work without the supervision of a guild) was created in 1777. The emergence of a bourgeois and urban class after 1789, and the beginning of what can be seen as a proto-feminist movement were both factors that contributed to the growth in the number of women taking up the profession of painter. Around thirty women exhibited at the Salon during the Revolution, and this had risen to as many as two hundred in the 1820s.

For a woman, painting herself or having herself painted at work therefore became an iconography with political overtones. Marie-Guillemine Benoist (1768-1825) depicted herself at her easel as early as 1786 (Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe, inv. 309) and Marie-Denise Villiers dite Nisa (1774-1821) painted herself with her portfolio on her lap (Metropolitan Museum, New York, inv. 17.120.204) a few years later. Male artists also portrayed their female colleagues at work, such as Guillon-Léthière's (1860-1832) portrait of Eugénie Servières (1786-1855), shown holding her drawing board under her arm (Worcester Art Museum, inv. 1954.21) or Boilly (1761-1845) who painted a scene of a female artist in her studio (La peintre dans son atelier, Staatsliche museum, Schwerin, inv. G240).

Unfortunately, the artist of shown here offers few clues as to her identity. On her belt, she wears a very pretty cameo reminiscent of the work of the miniaturist Jacques-Joseph de Gault (1738-1817), a fashionable accessories maker of the period, and a piece of jewellery that could be likened to a memento mori.
Brought to you by
Bérénice VerdierAssociate Specialist
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