Portrait of a young girl, half-length, in a white frilled dress and blue sash, holding a cherry branch

Marie Élisabeth Lemoine belonged to an unusual and impressive network of female painters in Paris at the end of the Eighteenth Century. She was the sister of Marie-Denise Villers and Marie-Victoire Lemoine, and cousin of Jeanne-Élisabeth Chaudet (whose brother, Jean-Frédéric Gabiou, Marie Élisabeth married in 1789). It is not known with whom she studied; her life seems to have been eclipsed somewhat by her better known sisters, who were students of Anne-Louis Girodet and François-Guillaume Ménageot respectively. The sisters were also connected variously with studios of Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, baron Gérard and Jacques-Louis David; the influence of all can be seen woven into their work. Another obfuscating element in the reconstruction of Marie Élisabeth's life is the confusion of her name and signature with that of the pastellist Élisabeth Lemoine, née Bouchet. It is likely that in the case of the present portrait, the signature was altered from 'Elith Lemoine' to the incorrect 'Elith Lebrun', which will have also lent weight to the earlier suggestion that the sitter was the young Mlle La Live de La Briche, whose portrait by Vigée Le Brun was shown at the Salon of 1787.
We would like to thank Joseph Baillio for his help in cataloguing the present lot.