Lady in Red Blouse by Gustave-Jean Jacquet

$9,500.00

Oil on canvas

36 × 26 in

Framed: 44 x 36 ½ in.

The woman in a red blouse sits in a quiet moment of reflection, one hand poised on her hip, the other resting on crossed legs and holding a memento, with a contemplative gaze looking into the distance. This full-length portrait became representative of the work of French academic painter Gustave-Jean Jacquet (French, 1846-1909), whose portraits captured the graceful and feminine character of the sitters, sometimes dressing them in costumes from earlier eras. The soft features of this young maiden, the technical brushstrokes that masterfully render the various fabrics - the delicate, sheer shawl, the sheen of the blouse and skirt, the texture and floral detail of the cotton clothe at her waist - illustrate his artistic skill, while the simplicity of the atmospheric background lends to the emotive charge of this quiet moment.

Jacquet, whose sole artistic instructor was William Adolphe Bouguereau, debuted at the Salon of 1865, with an allegory, The Dream, a painting that clearly depicted the influence of Bouguereau. In the following years, he developed his own style of genre painting that evoked in great detail the elegant life of the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries.

In 1868, he was awarded a third-class medal for his Departure of the Army in the 16th Century, and was decorated with the Legion d’Honneur in 1879.

Works by Jacquet are housed in public and private institutions, including collections in Blois, Chateau-Thierry, Rouen, Paris, and Sheffield (England), as well as The Brooklyn Museum of Art, The Art Institute of Chicago, and the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.