Jean-Honoré Fragonard

Henri Michel-Lévy,
his sale, Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, 12 May 1919, lot 81, reproduced;
Gabriel Cognac,
his sale, Paris, 14 May 1952, lot 2, reproduced pl. 11.;
with Galerie Cailleux, Paris, where acquired by the present owner in 1979

Paris, Hôtel Sagan, Fragonard, 1931, no. 43

L. Réau, Fragonard, Brussels 1956, p.215;
A. Ananoff, L'oeuvre dessinée de J.H. Fragonard, Paris 1961, vol. I, cat. no. 166, reproduced fig. 68;
G. Brey, 'El voluptuoso himno a la vida del pintor Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1732-1806)', in La Voz de Galicia, 21 janvier 1988

This sheet belongs to a group of chalk figure studies of young women, where the artist's primary interest was in describing the play of light across full silk skirts.¹ Although many of Fragonard's best known works of this type (such as the splendid sheet sold in 1998²) are executed in red chalk, the less familiar black chalk examples like this have their own distinctive and atmospheric quality.  A similar study of a fashionable young woman in black chalk, but with touches of wash in the background, is in the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa.³

Fragonard probably began this series of drawings in the mid-1770s and continued past 1780. Contrary to opinions popular in the past, the studies do not seem to have been intended as portraits, nor can it be convincingly shown that they portray Marguerite Gérard or Rosalie Fragonard. In the present example, the model's posture suggests a pause during a dance, which introduces a lively anecdotal element.

We are very grateful to Eunice Williams for her help in cataloguing this drawing.

1.  See P. Rosenberg, Fragonard, exhib. cat., Paris, Grand Palais, and New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987-8, pp. 432-6
2.  Sale, New York, Sotheby's, 28 January 1998, lot 56
3.  Ananoff, op.cit., vol .I, no.193; E. Williams, Drawings by Fragonard in North American Collections, exhib. cat., Washington, National Gallery of Art, Cambridge, Mass., Fogg Art Museum, and New York, The Frick Collection, 1978-9, no. 56.