Portrait Of Francoise-Marie De Bourbon, Workshop Of Pierre Gobert

This elegant presumed portrait of Francoise-Marie de Bourbon depicts her mid-body, turned three-quarters, her slender figure standing out against a landscape. The young woman poses in a park and stands near a large terracotta vase where the carnations grow. Look turned to the viewer, she is wearing a fountain, with two curly locks framing the forehead. Her hair is raised and adorned with a diadem of pearls and a central ruby that holds a large veil of transparent organza with pearly reflections and decorated with broad golden bands. She is dressed in a red satin dress with a silk yoke embroidered with gold thread on her breast. She wears a white lace shirt, whose creases emerge from her cleavage and her sleeves, carefully raised by gemstone staples. A golden belt with a loop set with stones brings out the sheer size of the princess. With her left hand she holds a carnation, a symbol of passion and marriage. The veil creates an important movement behind the model and thus brings lightness and dynamism to the portrait. The hand raising the dress causes the formation of many folds in the fabrics, that the painter accentuates by illuminating the crests, and shading the hollow parts to give volume to the whole. Direct theatrical lighting accentuates the whiteness of the flesh and folds of the drapes and detaches the model from the landscape.
Oil on canvas, late 17th century.
Beautiful 17th century giltwood frame finely carved with sunflowers and laurel leaves.
Dimensions: h. 47.5 cm, l. 36 cm.
With the frame: h. 66 cm, l. 54.5 cm.

Françoise-Marie de Bourbon, known as the "Second Mademoiselle de Blois" 1, born May 4, 1677, at the Château de Maintenon, died February 1, 1749, in Saint-Cloud, legitimate daughter of France, by her marriage Duchess of Chartres and Duchess of Orleans, was a natural girl whom Louis XIV secretly had of the Marquise de Montespan. Louis XIV gave to Marie-Marie on February 18, 16923, his nephew Philippe d'Orleans, Duke of Chartres, future Regent. They had eight children.

Pierre Gobert (Fontainebleau, 1662 - Paris, 1744) Born into a family of artists, Pierre Gobert began working at a very young age for the court. From 1682, he received the order of the Portrait of the Duke of Burgundy a few weeks old (lost), the first of a long list of portraits of children, a genre in which Gobert excelled the most. Accredited at the Royal Academy in 1686, Pierre Gobert was concerned about his reception, an exceptional fact, only fifteen years later. It is true that already overloaded with orders, his career as a portrait painter, especially in Munich for the Bavarian court, probably left him little time. From 1707, Gobert worked for the court of Lorraine where he had been called by the Duke Leopold. During this visit, he paints an impressive number of portraits that imply the existence of a workshop. Back in Paris he works very regularly for the Court realizing the portraits of most members of the royal family, whose castle of Versailles keeps the most interesting examples.