Attributed To Adolf Ulrik Wertmüller (1751-1811) - Bust Portraits Of A Man And A Woman

Adolf Ulrik Wertmüller was the cousin of the renowned portrait painter Roslin, who became his patron during his time in France. The Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture awarded him a medal as early as 1773. After extended stays in Rome and Lyon, where he established a reputation as a portraitist, he returned to settle in Paris. Accepted by the Academy in 1783, he was admitted as a full member in 1784. Embraced by the Swedish elite of the capital and supported by Gustav III, he was then appointed "in reversion as First Painter to His Majesty the King of Sweden." He achieved fleeting fame at the Salon of 1785, when he exhibited "The Queen, the Dauphin, and Madame, the King's daughter, strolling in the English garden of the Petit Trianon." Subjected to the jealousy of numerous artists and art critics, he subsequently received few official commissions. After a long stay in Bordeaux between 1788 and 1790, the French Revolution forced him into exile. He traveled to the United States, where he painted the portrait of George Washington. Returning briefly to Paris in 1797, he painted Aimée de Coigny, the "Young Captive" of the poet André Chénier. He emigrated permanently to the United States in 1800, where he married and spent the rest of his life.

The two companion paintings we are presenting are typical of Wertmüller's work during his time in Bordeaux. The man, with curled and powdered hair, wears a yellow waistcoat with floral motifs under his velvet coat. The woman, whose ample hair falls in rolling curls over her shoulders, wears a muslin dress adorned with a blue ribbon and a matching belt.

Our portrait of a man is similar to the one sold by Sloane Street Auctions in London on July 8, 2025. (https://www.sloanestreetauctions.com/catalogue/lot/302ded20624dbc2d6e7b6278e6ea68e2/f696df3e52c0cf46109d4cecaabb248f/the-summer-fine-art-auction-to-include-noble-estates-lot-254/)

Our portrait of a woman is similar to the one sold by Artcurial in Paris on September 27, 2022. (https://www.artcurial.com/ventes/4205/lots/168-a)

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