Portrait of a Woman
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
39 1/2 x 32 in. (100.3 x 81.3 cm)
Classification
Paintings
Department
European Paintings
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Catharine Lorillard Wolfe Collection, Wolfe Fund, 1910
Accession Number
10.41
Tags
About this artwork
Henri Fantin-Latour's "Portrait of a Woman" (1885), also known as "Portrait de Mme Leroy," presents an enigmatic subject whose true identity remains unknown. The sitter called herself Madame Leroy, a name the artist suspected was false, and insisted on paying for her portrait in advance—unusual circumstances that have fueled speculation about her identity and social status. She was accompanied to some sittings by an American named Becker, who also commissioned his own portrait from Fantin-Latour...
About the Artist
Henri Fantin-Latour · 1836–1904
Ignace Henri Jean Théodore Fantin-Latour was born on January 14, 1836, in Grenoble, France, to portrait painter Théodore Fantin-Latour, who gave him his earliest drawing lessons. The family relocated to Paris in 1841, where in 1850, at age 14, he enrolled in the École de Dessin, studying under Horace Lecoq de Boisbaudran, whose innovative memory-based method of drawing from observation profoundly ...