Lot Essay
The sitter is probably Matilda Eliza Moffat, daughter of Col. John Bayard, who was married in 1823 to Alexander William Robert Macdonald, Bt., the eldest son of the 3rd Lord Macdonald.
Details
SIMON-JACQUES ROCHARD, signed and dated June 1830
Lady Macdonald holding an open miniature-case in her left hand, her head resting on her right hand, her black hair dressed in loose ringlets, wearing gold pendant earrings, a white dress and a fur-edged orange cloak, a checked green tartan draped over her thighs, interior background with a curtain and an oil painting on the wall; rectangular -- 140 x 108 mm, the left-hand border with artist's join, gilt-metal mount within a mahogany panel.
Lady Macdonald holding an open miniature-case in her left hand, her head resting on her right hand, her black hair dressed in loose ringlets, wearing gold pendant earrings, a white dress and a fur-edged orange cloak, a checked green tartan draped over her thighs, interior background with a curtain and an oil painting on the wall; rectangular -- 140 x 108 mm, the left-hand border with artist's join, gilt-metal mount within a mahogany panel.
Provenance
Collection of the Belgian ministre plénipotentiaire Garnier-Heldewier; Félix Doistau Collection, Paris (in 1912); his sale, Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, 18 and 19 June 1928, lot 185, ill. opp. p. 60, sold 2,400 Francs.
Literature
Léo R. Schidlof, La miniature en Europe, Graz, 1964, II, pp. 705-706.
Exhibited
Exposition de la miniature, Brussels, Hôtel Goffinet, March-July 1912, nr 1055 (lent by Félix Doistau); Musée du Louvre, in the 1920s (lent by Félix Doistau); Chefs-d'oeuvre de la miniature et de la gouache, Geneva, Musée d'Art et d'Histoire, June-August 1956, nr 378; Meisterwerke der europäischen Miniaturmalerei, Vienna, Albertina, March-May 1965, nr 321.