François Joseph LONSING (Bruxelles 1739 - Léognan, près de B - Lot 19

Lot n° 19
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Estimation :
5000 - 7000 EUR
François Joseph LONSING (Bruxelles 1739 - Léognan, près de B - Lot 19
François Joseph LONSING (Bruxelles 1739 - Léognan, près de Bordeaux 1799) Portrait of Madame Dauberval, dancer at the Paris, London and Bordeaux Opera (circa 1785). She is dressed in a white muslin gown trimmed with lace, wearing a large tulle bonnet à la baigneuse, with a gold-encrusted mother-of-pearl fan in her left hand. Original oil on canvas. 80.5 x 65 cm. On the reverse, three small pieces of reinforcement. Some restorations; small gaps. Marie-Madeleine Crespée (Paris 1760 - Auderige 1799), a pupil of the dancer Jean-Baptiste Lany (1718-1786), debuted at the Opéra in 1777 as Melle Théodore in the ballet Myrtil et Lycoris, before marrying (1783) the dancer Jean Bercher dit Dauberval (1742-1806), former protégé of the Du Barry, favorite of Louis XV. After becoming ballet master at the Opéra de Bordeaux, Jean Dauberval composed an "anacreontic" ballet, Le Bonheur est d'aimer, in which his wife made her debut (February 1785), before making a name for herself in other ballets he had also composed: La Fille mal gardée, Le Déserteur, Télémaque, l'Epreuve villageoise, etc. According to the Mercure and Mme de La Roche, Madame Dauberval established herself as a great artist, with precise, brilliant playing, who emulated her famous contemporaries Melle Sallé, Guimard and Camargo (Cf. Jeanne Méaudre de Lapouyade, p. 10). Provenance: Former collection of the Baroness de G... at Château de R... en Agenais. Bibliography: Jeanne Méaudre de Lapouyade, Un portrait de Madame Dauberval par Lonsing. Revue Historique de Bordeaux et du département de la Gironde. Year 1915, 8th year (n° 4, pp. 202-210). The portrait, reproduced full-page (202), is described at length by the author, from whom we have taken some elements (pp. 207 & 208). After noting the model's grace, "her somewhat romantic and sentimental soul, her ardent and willful nature, her sparkling wit and all the finesse of her feminine diplomacy", Meaudre de Lapouyade dwells at length on the execution of the fit and accessories: "A whole light range of silvery grays, blues and pinks, discreetly supported by the warm hues of the face and the brown aureole of the hair, rises from the satins and laces, creating a tender harmony,, luminous and cheerful, set off by the dark tones of the background". Exhibition: Bordeaux, Musée des Beaux - Arts, Le port des Lumières. La peinture à Bordeaux 1750-1800, catalog no. 38 (where it is reproduced), pp. 137 (quoted) and pp. 142 & 143 - text by Bernardette de Boysson (Musée des Beaux - Arts de Bordeaux & William Blake & C°- 1989 edition).
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