"Provenance: M. Besselieure, circa 1781.
This fascinating painting is a rare erotic genre scene by one of the
most celebrated portrait painters of the ancien régime, executed in 1774-1775 when the
prodigious artist was only 19 or 20 years of age. Although the image -- of a
beautiful, semi-nude young woman who has been thrown into a state of
emotional distress over the contents of a letter that she has just read --
might suggest the plight of a girl who has given her virginity to a cad and
been promptly abandoned by him, the picture
was engraved with the more morally ambiguous title La Vertu Irrésolue:
'Irresolute Virtue'.
While it is neither signed nor dated, and does not appear in the list of
painted works compiled by the artist, there can be no doubt that the present
painting is by vigee Le Brun, for it was engraved as her work by R. Dennel
and published in 1781; the print was sold as the pendant to another engraving
by Dennel after a painting by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin, Comparaison de Bouton
de Rose (see E. Dacier, Gabriel de
Saint-Aubin, Peintre, dessinateur et graveur (1724-1780), Paris, 1929, I, pl.
XII; and II, no. 373). That print -- which depicts a cheerful, semi-clad
young woman sitting in bed and comparing the pinkness of her nipple with that
of a rose -- would seem to represent the joy of sexual innocence, while the
print after the present painting alludes to the sorrowful aftermath of a fall
from virtue. The engraving of Comparaison de Bouton de Rose was dedicated to
Madame de Saint-Aubin (curiously, as the painter, who had died the year
before, was never married), while the print of La Vertu Irrésolue was
dedicated to 'Madame Lebrun, peintre.' Interestingly, that dedication refers
to the artist by her married name, but the author of the image is identified
beneath it with the inscription of her maiden name -- 'Louise-Elisabeth Vigée pinxit' -- suggesting that while the print was published well after her
marriage to the art dealer Jean-Baptiste-Pierre Le Brun on 11 January 1776,
the painting itself had been executed before. The style of the painting --
despite its easy and accomplished handling and sophisticated palette --
accords well with an early dating of circa 1774-5, according to Joseph
Baillio.
We are grateful to Joseph Baillio for providing information for the entry
above and for confirming the attribution of the painting to Vigée Le Brun, on the basis of a photograph.
"La Vertue Irresolue" sold for $204,000 in early 2000.
Earl de Grey (according to a label on the frame).
Anon. Sale, Hôtel Drouot, Paris, 16 December
1985, lot 20.