François de Troy

Anonymous sale, Paris, Palais Galliéra, 23 June 1969, lot 23 (as attributed to Robert Levrac-Tournieres);

Jean Cailleux family collection, Paris;

By whom sold ("Property of Cailleux"), New York, Christies, 23 October 1998, lot 39;

Where acquired by Michael Rosenberg (d. 2003), Dallas;

His estate sale ("Property from the estate of Michael L. Rosenberg"), New York, Christies, 26 January 2005, lot 227;

Where acquired by the present owner.

J. Cailleux, “Some Family and Group Portraits by François de Troy,” in Burlington Magazine 113, no. 817 (April 1971), supplement p. v-vii, reproduced pl. 3.

This painting was first securely placed within the oeuvre of François de Troy when Jean Cailleux distinguished the artist’s production from that of his son, Jean‑François de Troy. In his 1971 article “Some Family and Group Portraits by François de Troy,” Cailleux reassigned the work, which had been long attributed to Robert Levrac‑Tournières, to the elder de Troy, linking it to a group of late family portraits. Dress details, the furnishings, and the dating of the silver‑mounted Chinese porcelain coffee service to 1722–1727 (established by silver specialist Jacques Helft) collectively anchor the composition to the final phase of the painter’s career. The sculptures of Charity and Justice flanking the chimney identify the sitter as a magistrate, while the presence of two exotically costumed young servants offering coffee hints at connections to overseas trade. De Troy enriches the scene with an unusual degree of animation: the informally posed father leaning toward his wife, the mother gesturing with a rolled sheet while steadying her daughter, the lively exchange between the two sons, and the attendants introducing a gilded table into the room. This orchestration of domestic movement anticipates the emerging tableaux de mode associated with the artist’s son, suggesting a collaborative ideology within the family studio.¹

¹ J. Cailleux, “Some Family and Group Portraits by François de Troy,” in Burlington Magazine 113, no. 817 (April 1971), supplement p. v-vii, reproduced pl. 3.