Queen Marie-Antoinette (1755-1793), facing right in gold-bordered white satin dress with gold-bordered blue sash, white-bordered pale blue muslin scarf tied in her long curled powdered hair

Details

FRANÇOIS DUMONT (1751-1831)
Queen Marie-Antoinette (1755-1793), facing right in gold-bordered white satin dress with gold-bordered blue sash, white-bordered pale blue muslin scarf tied in her long curled powdered hair
signed 'Dumont.' (mid-right)
oval, 2 1/8 in. (52 mm.) high, silver-gilt frame with glazed silk reverse

Provenance

Michel Heine, Paris
John Pierpont Morgan (1837-1913), New York; (+) Christie's, London, 24-27 June 1935, lot 505 (42gns. to Spink).

Literature

G. C. Williamson, Catalogue of the Collection of Miniatures, The Property of J. Pierpont Morgan, IV, London, 1907, no. 607, p. 57 (sitter unidentified).

Special notice

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Further details

(SEE ALSO CATALOGUE FRONT COVER)

Lot Essay

Although Dumont executed numerous rather official miniatures of the Queen from the late 1770s onwards, he did not become her favourite miniaturist until after Campana's death in 1786. The present miniature can be dated about 1790 by comparison with the magnificent family portrait in the Louvre, delivered to the Queen on 29 January 1790, illustrated in P. Jean-Richard, Miniatures sur ivoire. Musée du Louvre. Musée d'Orsay, Paris, 1994, pp. 116-117, no. 184. Another similar miniature is in the Cleveland Museum of Art, illustrated in B. Hofstetter, 'François Dumont, peintre de la Cour', Le Pays Lorrain, vol. 76, no. 3, July-September 1995, pp. 189-196.
The present miniature will be included B. Hofstetter's forthcoming catalogue raisonné of François Dumont's works.

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