Portrait of a Young Woman

Louis Léopold Boilly

ca. 1798–99 · Oil on paper, laid down on canvas · European Paintings

The sober modesty projected by this unidentified young woman is characteristic of ascendant middle-class elegance during the later Directory period. Elements such as her hair—swept up in the simplest nod to current fashion without the careful curls seen on wealthier women in formal portraits—suggest a date of about 1798–99. Boilly painted portraits in this format in two-and-one-half hours or less, so that his clients could take them away following the sitting; he claimed to have painted 4,500 of them.

Artist

Louis Léopold Boilly

Date

ca. 1798–99

Medium

Oil on paper, laid down on canvas

Department

European Paintings

Credit line

The Whitney Collection, Promised Gift of Wheelock Whitney III, and Purchase, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Charles S. McVeigh, by exchange, 2003