Henri Blanc-fontaine (1819-1897). The Girl With The Pearl Earring

Oil on cardboard, signed lower right. We do not know the identity of the young girl depicted whose illuminated, pure and virginal face stands out from the dark background. The painter in his younger years, no doubt secretly in love with this young person, of disturbing beauty, represents her dressed in a short white tunic, a symbol of purity and a skirt whose madder hue aims to translate passion. She wears a pearl in her left ear, another symbol of chastity and purity. The branch flowered with carnations, offered, which she delicately holds in her right hand, expresses through the red and white colors of its corollas the faithful and shared passion.