Attributed to ANTOINE VESTIER (1740-1824)

THE PROPERTY OF A PRIVATE COLLECTOR

Details

Attributed to ANTOINE VESTIER (1740-1824)

Portrait of a Lady, said to be the Princesse de Lamballe, standing three-quarter length, wearing a white dress with a blue sash, beside a tree with a grapevine

inscribed on the edge of her collar 'mors et vita' and on the edge of her sleeve 'longé & pro***'--oil on canvas--oval
31½ x 25¼in. (79.3 x 61.6cm.)

Provenance

Possibly Sir Alfred Beit, Russborough, Ireland

Literature

possibly, J.-C. Sueur, Le Portraitiste Antoine Vestier (1740-1874), 1974, p. 118, no. 22

Exhibited

Possibly Versailles, Musée Nationale du Chateau, Marie-Antoinette, archiduchesse, dauphine et Reine, 1955, no. 263, lent by Sir Alfred Beit

Lot Essay

Marie-Thérèse Louise of Savoy-Carignano, Princesse de Lamballe (1749-1792) was born in Turin. In 1767 she was married to Louis Alexandre Stanislaus de Bourbon, Prince de Lamballe, son of the duc de Penthièvre and great-grandson of Louis XIV. She was companion and confidante to Marie-Antoinette who appointed her surintendent of the royal household. In 1791 she travelled to England to appeal for help for the royal family but returned, unsuccessful, to the Tuileries Palace where she remained until the 10th of August, 1792 when she was arrested along with Marie-Antoinette and imprisoned in the Temple. Upon refusal to take an oath against the monarchy, she was delivered to the populace on September 3rd and killed after which her head was placed on a pike and paraded before the Queen's prison window.