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Lot Essay
The present work will be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné of Berthe Morisot currently being prepared by Yves Rouart.
The sheet is one of two preparatory drawings for the portrait of Louise Riesener (Musée d'Orsay, Paris, fig. 1), which Morisot painted in 1888 in her Parisian studio in the rue de Villejust. She exhibited the canvas in 1893 at Boussod & Valadon, and later, with pride of place, in her 1896 monographic exhibition at Durand-Ruel.
Louise Riesener, who would become Mme Léouzon-Le-Duc, was the daugther of the painter Léon Riesener (1808-1878), cousin of Delacroix and a friend of Henri Fantin-Latour, who in 1879 had been in charge of organising the posthumous exhibition of his work. Fantin was also the art teacher to Louise, whom he portrayed twice, in 1879 and 1880.
Louise and her sister Rosalie belonged to the social and artistic milieu of Morisot, and they were keen models to the artist. Louise and Berthe were, actually, linked by a deeper elective affinity - the common passion for painting. Fantin's La Leçon de dessin (Brussels, Musées royaux des beaux-arts de Belgique, 1879, fig.2) pays homage to Louise's artistic ambitions: the young woman is captured in the carefully closed world of the atelier, flanked by her friend Emma Callimachi-Catargi, during a teaching session in the artist's studio.
The sheet is one of two preparatory drawings for the portrait of Louise Riesener (Musée d'Orsay, Paris, fig. 1), which Morisot painted in 1888 in her Parisian studio in the rue de Villejust. She exhibited the canvas in 1893 at Boussod & Valadon, and later, with pride of place, in her 1896 monographic exhibition at Durand-Ruel.
Louise Riesener, who would become Mme Léouzon-Le-Duc, was the daugther of the painter Léon Riesener (1808-1878), cousin of Delacroix and a friend of Henri Fantin-Latour, who in 1879 had been in charge of organising the posthumous exhibition of his work. Fantin was also the art teacher to Louise, whom he portrayed twice, in 1879 and 1880.
Louise and her sister Rosalie belonged to the social and artistic milieu of Morisot, and they were keen models to the artist. Louise and Berthe were, actually, linked by a deeper elective affinity - the common passion for painting. Fantin's La Leçon de dessin (Brussels, Musées royaux des beaux-arts de Belgique, 1879, fig.2) pays homage to Louise's artistic ambitions: the young woman is captured in the carefully closed world of the atelier, flanked by her friend Emma Callimachi-Catargi, during a teaching session in the artist's studio.