Description:

inscribed, signed and dated, at left: Le 12 Janvier 1765 / Portefaire age de 12 ans / Arrache a la bete un / de ses petits camarades / Sannté a recompense / La bravure et / L’amour citoyen / de ce petit heros / Therese Deslandes / Mon(?) de monsigneur / Le comte d’Artois / 1765
pen and brown and black inks, grey and brown wash, gouache
195 x 186 mm

Provenance:

Private collection, France

Note:

This atmospheric grisaille depicts the dramatized public elogy of an intrepid boy’s bravery. Set to the music of a violin and raised on a modest platform, a man and woman, perhaps witnesses of the event or actors, illustrate the tale represented on the painted screen behind them. A crowd, comprised largely of women and their children, talk animatedly between themselves, and watch on. The inscribed screen relates that on January 12, 1765, a young boy was torn away from his friends by a large wolf or hound. Portefaire, a brave youth, saved his friend from the beast and managed to drive it away with sticks.

While evidently accomplished as an artist and well versed in compositional arrangement, Thérèse Deslandes, remains untraceable. Her fate is akin to that of many women artists who have been excluded from the historical record.