Faustine Léo (1832–1865)
1842
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
39 3/8 in. × 32 in. (100 × 81.3 cm)
Classification
Paintings
Department
European Paintings
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Purchase, Wolfe Fund and Mr. and Mrs. Frank E. Richardson Gift, 2004
Accession Number
2004.243
Tags
Art Historical Context
Henri Lehmann’s 1842 portrait presents Faustine Léo as a composed young girl, her direct gaze and delicate features rendered with quiet sensitivity. Painted when she was only ten years old, the work preserves a moment from a life that would end prematurely in 1865. The simple title and the museum’s classification as a European painting underscore its role as both a personal likeness and a document of mid-nineteenth-century childhood. Executed in oil on canvas, the medium allowed Lehmann to achieve the soft transitions of light and the fine modeling of fabrics that give the figure a lifelike p...
About the Artist
Henri Lehmann
French, Kiel 1814–1882 Paris