A fortune teller takes a young woman's hand while a boy lifts her purse, French genre scene, oil on canvas, 18th century

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The Fortune Teller and the Stolen Purse, French Genre Scene, Oil on Canvas, 18th Century, Unframed

French School, 18th century

Price $5,785 USD

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The painting shown to scale on a pale wall above a chest of drawers

The older woman has already taken hold of her hand, and the gesture holds the young woman's attention on the wrong side of the picture

The relined canvas on its stretcher, the crossbars and corner keys in place

Red and black drapery covering the second figure from head to foot, only the face and the hands left showing

Seen from an angle, the tacking edge of the unframed canvas and the losses that run along it

The pleated ruff stands high behind her head and a blue ribbon is tied flat at the breast, a costume of the sixteenth century worn in the eighteenth

Powdered hair set with small flowers and pins, the face of its own century under a borrowed costume

One finger at his lips, the red purse already clear of the gold dress

Two cypresses close the left side, with the light dropping behind them

Pale gold silk falling in wide folds across the whole lower half of the canvas

A period ink inscription on the stretcher, naming a Paris owner and an address in the seventh arrondissement

She is looking at us, not at the woman holding her hand. That is the whole point of the picture, and the boy at the lower left has already taken advantage of it.

Oil on canvas, 29 x 25 inches (74 x 64 cm). Unsigned. French, second half of the eighteenth century. Unframed.

Three figures against a column and an open sky. The seated woman is in pale gold silk with blue ribbons, a pleated lace ruff standing high behind her head. The older woman leans in from the right, wrapped in red and black, and takes her hand. Below on the left a boy in a dark cap raises one finger to his lips and lifts a red purse clear of the gold dress with his other hand. Two cypresses close the left side and the light drops behind them.

A costume already two hundred years old when it was painted

The ruff, the slashed sleeves and the ribboned shoulders belong to the end of the sixteenth century, not to the period of the picture. Dressing a sitter in old clothes was a recognised pleasure in eighteenth century French painting, and it placed a scene at a comfortable distance from the person looking at it. The face and the powdered hair were not disguised, and they are of their own time.

The canvas has been relined at some point in its life, which is why a picture of this age is still flat and sound. The reverse carries a period ink inscription giving the name Comte d'Adhemar de Panat and an address in the seventh arrondissement of Paris. There are small paint losses along the edges, where an old frame sat, and the surface is otherwise stable.

Provenance ▾

Inscribed on the reverse of the stretcher, Comte d'Adhemar de Panat, 33 rue de Verneuil, Paris VII

Artist

French School, 18th century

Period

Late 18th century

Origin

France

Style

Genre

Medium

Oil on canvas

Signature

Unsigned

Frame

Unframed

Features

Original, one of a kind

Painting

29 x 25 inches

Framed

Unframed

Condition

Good original condition, unlined and on its original keyed stretcher. Small paint losses along all four edges where an old frame sat. Surface stable, with age craquelure throughout.

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