Portrait Of A Man From The Restoration Period

Beautiful bust portrait of a man from the Restoration period. He is standing in a loggia with fluted columns in front of a dark curtain. It opens on the left onto a landscape planted with pines, cypresses, and other varieties. This could be the park of his property or a landscape from southern Europe, e.g., Italy, which he visited on the Grand Tour. Or he wants to express his tastes and affinities as a cultured man. How can we define the attitude of this character? Distinguished, elegant, and self-confident, without a doubt, but more than that. We are faced with a rather complex portrait. It is certainly not a work by the great Ingres, as the apocryphal signature at the bottom left claims, but our artist has succeeded in portraying a man beyond his social status as a wealthy, cultured bourgeois in the complexity of his character .The portrait is dated 1848. Note the great finesse of execution, particularly of the face.