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Lot Essay
This beautiful portrait is previously unknown and unpublished according to Joseph Baillio, the leading authority on Vigée Le Brun’s life and work, and it is not known in any other versions or copies. Although it does not bear a date, the painting can be confidently assigned to the years shortly after 1800, based upon its manner of execution and the sitter’s fashionable costume. Her upswept hair, bound round her head in Grecian style, knotted on top, with small cedilla ringlets pressed against her forehead and temples and held in place by a gold diadem and cameo, reflects a fashion that was popularized during the reign of Josephine Bonaparte, who married Napoleon in 1796 and was crowned Empress eight years later. Inspired by ancient statuary, a similar hairstyle is found in Jacques-Louis David’s famous portrait of Madame Recamier (1800; Paris, Louvre) and numerous other French portraits of the period. As John Carr observed in 1802: ‘The French ladies every morning anoint their heads with the antique oil; their sidelocks are formed with small circles…and the hair behind is rolled into a rose, by which they produce a perfect copy of the ancient bust’ (J. Carr, The Stranger in France, London, 1803, p. 89). Likewise, our sitter’s fine muslin blouse trimmed with golden braid, blue satin gown adorned below her breasts with a gold and bejeweled belt, and amber-colored cashmere shawl, reflect women’s fashion in and around the French court during the First Empire.
By tradition, the portrait has been identified as depicting Mademoiselle George, the celebrated (and notorious) French stage actress. Born Marguerite-Josephine Weimer in 1787 in Bayeux, the self-styled ‘Mademoiselle George’ made her debut at the age of 15 in 1802 at the Théâtre Français in Paris. An immediate sensation, she was acclaimed one the leading tragediennes of the era, was received at several royal courts and performed throughout Europe – with long runs in St. Petersburg, Stockholm, and Dresden, among other capitals – until her retirement in 1853. Admired for her many notable appearances as Racine’s ‘Phédre’, she was almost as well-known for her illustrious lovers, including Napoleon Bonaparte (from 1802 until 1804) and his arch-rival, the Duke of Wellington (in 1814). In 1814 she bore her only child, Maria Alexandrovna Parijskaia, fathered by Czar Alexander I of Russia. Upon her retirement from the stage she received a pension from Jérôme Bonaparte, Napoleon’s brother, and died in Passy in 1867, age 80.
Although Mademoiselle George is mentioned in passing by Vigée Le Brun in her Souvenirs (published 1835-1837) – she praised George's Phèdre and her beauty (vol. III, p. 225) – the artist does not note ever having painted the actress’s portrait nor does she include such a portrait in her comprehensive (though admittedly incomplete) ‘List of Paintings’. Moreover, the actress was painted, drawn, sculpted and caricatured many times – by Baron François Gérard and Pierre-Jean David d’Angers, among others – and the present portrait does not bear a striking resemblance to her well-known features, as noted by Baillio (in conversation, 12 December 2024). Therefore, in the absence of more conclusive evidence, the subject of the portrait remains to be determined.
Certain, however, is the beauty and vitality of the painting’s execution: the deft drawing; delicacy in the modeling of flesh; rich, gem-toned palette; ease and effortlessness of pose; and ambient and warm sense of atmosphere – these hallmarks of her art are in clear evidence. The present portrait compares well to other portraits by the artist in the first years of the 19th century, including her sensitive rendering of Prince Ivan Ivanovich Baryatinsky in a Blue Mantle (The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow), painted in St. Petersburg in 1800; and the self-possessed Luise von Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Queen of Prussia (H.R.H. Georg Friedrich, Prince of Prussia, Hohenzollern Castle), executed in 1802 in Berlin. All three paintings evince Vigée Le Brun’s undiminished skills, late in her career, which surpassed those of even her most talented younger rivals and maintained her reputation as the unexcelled master of French portraiture.
Our thanks to Joseph Baillio for confirming the attribution of the painting to Vigée Le Brun, based on a photograph, and for his advice in the preparation of this entry.
By tradition, the portrait has been identified as depicting Mademoiselle George, the celebrated (and notorious) French stage actress. Born Marguerite-Josephine Weimer in 1787 in Bayeux, the self-styled ‘Mademoiselle George’ made her debut at the age of 15 in 1802 at the Théâtre Français in Paris. An immediate sensation, she was acclaimed one the leading tragediennes of the era, was received at several royal courts and performed throughout Europe – with long runs in St. Petersburg, Stockholm, and Dresden, among other capitals – until her retirement in 1853. Admired for her many notable appearances as Racine’s ‘Phédre’, she was almost as well-known for her illustrious lovers, including Napoleon Bonaparte (from 1802 until 1804) and his arch-rival, the Duke of Wellington (in 1814). In 1814 she bore her only child, Maria Alexandrovna Parijskaia, fathered by Czar Alexander I of Russia. Upon her retirement from the stage she received a pension from Jérôme Bonaparte, Napoleon’s brother, and died in Passy in 1867, age 80.
Although Mademoiselle George is mentioned in passing by Vigée Le Brun in her Souvenirs (published 1835-1837) – she praised George's Phèdre and her beauty (vol. III, p. 225) – the artist does not note ever having painted the actress’s portrait nor does she include such a portrait in her comprehensive (though admittedly incomplete) ‘List of Paintings’. Moreover, the actress was painted, drawn, sculpted and caricatured many times – by Baron François Gérard and Pierre-Jean David d’Angers, among others – and the present portrait does not bear a striking resemblance to her well-known features, as noted by Baillio (in conversation, 12 December 2024). Therefore, in the absence of more conclusive evidence, the subject of the portrait remains to be determined.
Certain, however, is the beauty and vitality of the painting’s execution: the deft drawing; delicacy in the modeling of flesh; rich, gem-toned palette; ease and effortlessness of pose; and ambient and warm sense of atmosphere – these hallmarks of her art are in clear evidence. The present portrait compares well to other portraits by the artist in the first years of the 19th century, including her sensitive rendering of Prince Ivan Ivanovich Baryatinsky in a Blue Mantle (The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow), painted in St. Petersburg in 1800; and the self-possessed Luise von Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Queen of Prussia (H.R.H. Georg Friedrich, Prince of Prussia, Hohenzollern Castle), executed in 1802 in Berlin. All three paintings evince Vigée Le Brun’s undiminished skills, late in her career, which surpassed those of even her most talented younger rivals and maintained her reputation as the unexcelled master of French portraiture.
Our thanks to Joseph Baillio for confirming the attribution of the painting to Vigée Le Brun, based on a photograph, and for his advice in the preparation of this entry.