(Tournus 1725-1805 Paris) A portrait of a young woman with a cap, gazing to the left, pastel on cardboard, 31,8 x 24,2 cm, mounted, unframed, (Sch)

Comparative literature: P. Grate, French Paintings II: Eighteenth Century, Stockholm 1994, p. 160-161, Cat. 149; Jean-Bapiste Greuze, Exh. Cat. Dijon, Musée des Beaux-Arts, 11th June-7th August 1977, Cat. 29.

In the present study the young woman may be the artist’s wife, who sat for him for several of his paintings. The pose of the girl looking to the left reappears in a painting in the National Museum Stockholm (36 x 27 cm, Inv. NM 2197, Grate 1994, p. 160) and in a large format oil sketch for the painting "La Ménagère surprise" (The surprised maid) in the Musée Grobet-Labadié in Marseille (Exh. Cat. Dijon 1977, Cat. 29). Two drawings in red chalk and a painting with the portrait are preserved in the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Besancon (Inv.847.4.1).

All these works may be related to an abandoned composition "Les offres deshonnêtes" (An immoral proposal); the composition is known to us by a drawing (private collection, Grate 1994, p. 161, No. 4); the head of the girl is given in profile contrary to the other versions where the head is rendered in three quarter view. Another portrait study of the same girl with an almost identical pose was sold with Sotheby's, New York (Sale 2282, 27th Janaur 2010, lot 145).