Art Institute of Chicago

Self-Portrait

Nicolas de Largillière (French, 1656–1746)LinkedCulture matchlcp-d19d64938725

Date: c. 1725
Medium: Oil on canvas
Culture: France
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe
Institution: Art Institute of Chicago
Object ID: 69003

From the Art Institute of Chicago record

Nicolas de Largillière was among the most highly esteemed and prolific portrait painters working in the time of Louis XIV of France, and his popularity continued through the period of the regency that followed Louis's death in 1715. His portraits were admired for their deftly rendered textures and for the confident poses that lent a sense of grandeur and ease to the sitters. They were sought after by a diverse clientele, ranging from royalty and courtiers to the upper middle class. In this work, one of his many self-portraits, Largillière presented himself as fashionably dressed and self-assured, the master of his art. He depicted himself as ready to lay out a painting, working with a porte-crayon (a piece of chalk in a holder) on the blank canvas behind him.

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Provenance & credit

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Credit line: Charles H. and Mary F. S. Worcester Collection
Provenance: Possibly Ange Laurent de Lalive de Jully, Paris; sold Paris, March 5 (sale postponed until May 2-14), 1770, no. 54, “Le Portrait de ce Peintre tenant un porte-crayon, il est à mi corps & peint sur toile de 2 pieds 6 pouces de haut, sur 2 pieds de large” [81 x 64.8 cm], possibly to Métra (or Mettra), for 130 livres [annotated cat., Bibliothèque nationale de France]. Smirnoff Gallery, Moscow [according to Paris 1878 exh. cat.]. Alfred Edwards, Paris by 1878 [lent to Paris 1878]; sold Hôtel Drouot, Paris, May 25, 1905, no. 28 (ill.) to Ducrey, for Fr. 18,200 [annotated cat. in Frick Art Reference Library]. Jacquinot, Paris, from the 1920s [letter of 7 April 1987 from R. Pardo in curatorial file]; sold by Jacquinot to Galerie Pardo, Paris, 1987 [letter cited above]; sold to the Art Institute, 1987.