French School, 1881, after Nicolas Poussin
The Assumption of the Virgin
Oil on canvas

Unsigned, dated 1881 in red lower left. 24 ½ x 17 inches (62 x 43 cm), the frame 28 ¾ x 20 ¾ inches (73 x 53 cm). Moulded gilt frame. Unlined, on its keyed stretcher, with small losses.

The Virgin rises with her arms thrown open, carried by young angels whose draperies turn around her in a single upward movement. Below them the cloud breaks on a dark plain, and a walled town catches the last light on the horizon.

The angels are painted as adolescents, fully draped in pale yellow, rose and deep green, and the whole upper half is carried on those colors alone. The ground below is kept low and dark, so the eye goes straight up. The handling is careful and even, laid in thin smooth layers, with the flesh built in warm glazes and the date set down in red where the plain meets the frame.