Jean-Marc Nattier

La Baronne da Lopez-Tarragoya;
By whom sold, London, Christie's, 29 June 1973, lot 88, when acquired by the late owner.

X. Salmon, Jean-Marc Nattier, exhibition catalogue, Paris, Musée National des Châteaux de Versailles et de Trianon, 26 October 1999 - 30 January 2000, pp. 28 and 304 (as location unknown).

"The following condition report has been provided by Sarah Walden, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting has been firmly lined, probably some time ago - it was not possible to see behind - and there are narrow bands of retouching at all the edges. The restoration appears also not to be very recent, with a rather dim varnish that does not fully saturate the colour or show the variety of the brushwork in the background or the sumptuousness of the drapery. The surface has a fine sprinkling of distant specks, perhaps from mould in the priming, but this is faint. There is one small tear in the upper right background about an inch long, and a rather longer older slanting tear in the lower central drapery (2" long), but otherwise there just a few little lines of retouching to mute the craquelure occasionally. The head is finely intact, as is the lovely drapery generally, and despite the rather dim varnish and slightly unflattering surface, essentially the underlying delicate almost pastel tonality is well preserved. This report was not done under laboratory conditions."
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Although he was to end his years impoverished and bed-ridden, Nattier was perhaps the most successful painter of French Court society during the middle years of the 18th century and by 1743, when this portrait was executed, he was at the height of his fame; the year before, in 1742, he had painted Louis XV's daughter Henriette (1727-1759) in the guise of Flora,¹ and in 1745 he portrayed another daughter, Adéläide (1732-1800), in the guise of Diana.²  Further royal commissions followed until the late 1750s but thereafter his fame quickly waned and he was replaced at Court by the next generation of portrait painters, such as his son-in-law Louis Tocqué (1696-1772) and Maurice Quentin de la Tour (1704-1788).

The sitter, la Comtesse d'Andlau, née Marie Henriette de Polastron, married François Eleonor, Comte d'Andlau (1710-1763) and bore him three children: Antoine-Henri, later Comte d'Andlau (1746-1820), Louis d'Andlau (d. 1768), and Jeanne Françoise Aglaé d'Andlau (1746-1826). Marie-Henriette's great-niece, Gabrielle Yolande Martine de Polastron (1749-1793), later Duchesse de Polignac, was the most noted member of Louis XVI's court and was Marie-Antoinette's favourite lady-in-waiting and her confidente. On hearing the news of her beloved queen's execution in 1793 she herself died from grief. Her portrait by Elisabeth-Louise Vigée Le Brun is amongst the artist's most noted works and hangs today at Versailles (fig. 1).

1. Inv. no. MV3818; see C. Constans, Musée National du Château de Versailles: Les Peintures, vol. II, Paris 1995, p. 673, no. 3792, reproduced.
2. Inv. no. MV3805; see Constans, op. cit., p. 673, no. 3790, reproduced.