Eugène Delacroix

Description

The features of the model and the technique of our portrait can nevertheless be related to a drawing kept at the Morgan Library & Museum in New York, which represents Pauline Villot (Paris, 1812 – id., 1875) in an Algerian costume. A draughtsman, she was the wife of Frédéric Villot (Liège, 1809 – Paris, 1875), engraver and close friend of Delacroix, who rose through the professional ranks to become curator of paintings at the Louvre Museum in 1848. Pauline Villot was represented many times by the romantic artist: in addition to the ink drawing of New York, she was recognized as the probable model of the Prince of Denmark in the painting Hamlet and Horatio in the cemetery today at the Louvre, her features have been identified in a portrait of an oriental woman in the Bristol Museum and in an etching from 1833, this time without disguise but with an attitude close to our drawing. As a child, she was also the subject of a famous painting by Jeanne-Élisabeth Chaudet (Paris, 1767 – id., 1832). Walking in step, a military saber on her shoulder, she already showed an interest in games and disguises.