"young Girl In Prayer," A Pastel From 1809 That Inspired Marie Ernestine Serret's 1836 Painting

Important anonymous pastel from 1809 – Direct source for Marie-Ernestine Serret’s masterpiece (1836 Salon) Early 19th-century French school
Date of creation: November 25, 1809 (dated lower left)
Pastel dimensions: 48 cm x 41 cm
This magnificent pastel, with its distinct pre-Romantic charm, is a discovery of great interest for the history of 19th-century art. The composition depicts a young woman in prayer, her hands clasped before an open book on a lectern, dressed in an opulent blue gown with puffed sleeves edged in fur. Her headdress, encircled with pearls, holds a long, diaphanous veil—a medieval-inspired motif that heralds the beginnings of the Troubadour style. 
The significance of this work lies in the fact that it served as a model and direct source for the artist Marie-Ernestine Serret (1812–1883), a student of Hortense Haudebourt-Lescot. Serret drew direct inspiration from this pastel, dated 1809, to create her major oil-on-canvas painting in 1836, titled Young Girl, Study. Successfully exhibited at the Salons of the time, Serret’s painting is now part of the permanent collection of the La Rochelle Museum of Fine Arts.
Whether it was a studio masterpiece she copied during her training or a work from a private collection that made a deep impression on her, this pastel serves as the original model for one of the artist’s most poetic museum pieces.

• Technique: Dry pastel on paper; the pigments have retained remarkable freshness and a striking velvety quality in the faces and fabrics.
• Inscriptions: Dated in red ink in the artist’s own hand in the lower left corner: “November 25, 1809”. 
• Frame: The work is enhanced by a sumptuous period frame made of wood and gilded stucco, richly carved with a frieze of foliage, gadroons, and channels, in perfect aesthetic harmony with the pastel.