Offered by GSLR Antiques
French School, circa 1750. Circle or follower of Jean-Marc Nattier. Portrait of a lady in Franciscan dress, holding an open copy of *La Chasse du Cerf*. Oil on canvas, presented in a very rich Louis XV Rocaille frame in wood and stucco gilded with gold leaf (19th century frame).
Our beautiful portrait depicts an aristocrat, shown half-length, slightly turned to the right, in an architectural setting with a column. She wears a brown habit with a wide hood, with ample folds and a heavy fall, tied at the waist with a knotted braided cord — an explicit evocation of Franciscan dress. Her right hand rests on a large volume placed on a table covered with a blue-green drapery. The book is open to a printed page indicating a theatrical text, clearly identifiable as the comedy-ballet *La Chasse du Cerf* by Marc-Antoine Legrand, first performed in 1726 at the Comédie-Française.
This is a commissioned work with a double meaning, tinged with irony: the lady is represented in clothing clearly evoking the dress of Franciscan tertiaries — a loose brown robe and cord belt. This sartorial choice belongs not to the worldly register but to the representation of penitence, humility, and renunciation, typical of portraits of noble women who embraced a life of piety after widowhood, a moral crisis, or a late conversion. The identification of the title page of the open book, the comedy-ballet *La Chasse du Cerf* (1726), belongs instead to gallant literature. Marc-Antoine Legrand’s play stages an entertainment combining comic and mythological episodes celebrating pleasure. The presence of this book creates a deliberate iconographic antithesis with the Franciscan habit, a symbol of austerity and conversion. This contrast reveals a personality situated between two states: a woman who has withdrawn from the world without entirely leaving it, or a penitent whose gallant past remains perceptible.
Our painting is thus representative of the lightness of the libertine 18th century, a subtle irony on the part of the painter or patron, in the way it represents proclaimed virtue and internalized private pleasures.
It is an amusing work, with a double meaning, ideal for completing an 18th century collection and presenting an anecdote to visitors.
The painting is beautiful and well executed, with fresh colors. It is presented in a very fine and richly ornamented 19th century frame. A spectacular large-format work.
The painting has been cleaned and was formerly relined. The frame has fine gold-leaf gilding, cleaned by our gilder.
Frame dimensions: 90.4 × 106 cm
Canvas dimensions: 64 × 81 cm
