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a painting of a woman in a blue dress and a white hata picture of a painting of a man with flowers in his hairPhoto 3/4 du lota wooden chair that has a basket on top of it
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Rossini

180 - Élisabeth VIGÉE LE BRUN (1755–1842)
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Estimate €20,000 - €30,000
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Description
Élisabeth VIGÉE LE BRUN (1755–1842) Portrait of a Young Girl Pastel on canvas 61 × 50.7 cm signed and dated on the right ‘Vigée / 1772’ (barely visible) Bibliography Neil Jeffares, “VIGÉE LE BRUN, Élisabeth-Louise”, *Dictionary of Pastellists before 1800*, London, 2006, online edition, (https://www.pastellists.com/Articles/VigeeLeBrun.pdf), J.76.4182 (accessed 9 October 2026) We would like to thank Neil Jeffares, who confirmed the attribution of this pastel to Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun on the basis of a photograph. In 1772, Élisabeth Vigée was a 17-year-old girl who was already at a decisive stage in her professional development. The daughter of the pastel artist Louis Vigée (1715–1767), she learnt to draw from an early age. Following her father’s death, she trained mainly by copying the Flemish, Italian and French masters in Parisian collections, whilst receiving guidance from painters such as Gabriel Briard (1725–1777), Gabriel-François Doyen (1726–1806) and Joseph Vernet (1714–1789). She had set up her own studio in Paris by 1770 and was already earning a living from a clientele comprising members of the bourgeoisie and the aristocracy. She lived with her mother, Jeanne Maissin (1728–1800), who supervised her during modelling sessions, as well as her stepfather, the jeweller Jacques-François Le Sèvre. She continued to study pastels and oil painting diligently. Two years after this portrait was painted, she was admitted to the Académie de Saint-Luc. In 1776, she married the art dealer Jean-Baptiste Pierre Le Brun and, in 1778, she became the official portraitist to Queen Marie-Antoinette. Thanks to the patronage of the royal family, she was admitted to the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in 1783. Contrary to the common belief that pastel was merely a stepping stone to oil painting, it remained for her a fundamental medium to which she continually returned throughout her life. She valued it for the speed with which it could be executed and the immediacy of the result. She used it both for highly accomplished commissioned portraits and for preparatory studies intended to quickly capture an idea before painting it in oils. Joseph Baillio, the artist’s specialist, regards her as one of the greatest pastel artists of all time. Although the artist was still very young when she produced this portrait, the technique employed in this pastel already demonstrates her mastery, particularly in the distribution of light, the freshness of the colours and the authenticity of the expression. Other pastel portraits are known to exist, dating from the 1770s and 1780s, executed on sheets of the same dimensions: that of the young Alexandre Brongniart, from 1778 (private collection, J.76.148), a ‘young woman in a striped dress’ from 1789 (Bucharest, Museum of Fine Arts, J.76.466), and, above all, ‘Madame de Bonneuil, née Michelle Sentuary (1748–1829)’, from 1773 (J.76.214).
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About the sale CLASSICAL ART, Asian collection, antique paintings & works of art
Auction location
Auction time 11/04/2026 at 2:00 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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