Saturday, November 19, 2016

European Portraits of the early 19th century

attributed to Rafael Tegeo Diaz
Portrait of an unknown woman
19th century
oil on canvas
Prado, Madrid

"I gave up before birth, it is not possible otherwise, but birth there had to be, it was he, I was inside, that's how I see it, it was he who wailed, he who saw the light, I didn't wail, I didn't see the light, it's impossible I should have a voice, impossible I should have thoughts, and I speak and think, I do the impossible, it is not possible otherwise, it was he who had a life, I didn't have a life, a life not worth having, because of me, he'll do himself to death, because of me, I'll tell the tale, the tale of his death, the end of his life and his death, his death alone would not be enough, not enough for me, if he rattles it's he who will rattle, I won't rattle, he who will die, I won't die, perhaps they will bury him, if they find him, I'll be inside, it is not possible otherwise, that's how I see it, the end of his life and his death, how he will go about it, go about coming to an end, it's impossible I should know, I'll know, step by step, impossible I should tell, I'll tell, in the present, there will be no more talk of me, only of him, of the end of his life and his death, of his burial if they find him, that will be the end, I won't go on about worms ... "

– Samuel Beckett, from Fizzle 4 (1976) in The Complete Short Prose, 1929-1989 (New York : Grove Press, 1995)

Eugène Delacroix
Cavalier
19th century
watercolor
British Museum
(formerly owned by Edgar Degas)

Eugène Delacroix
Coachman
19th century
watercolor
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Eugène Delacroix
Madame Henri François Riesener
1835
oil on canvas
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Théodore Chassériau
Comtesse de La Tour-Maubourg
1841
oil on canvas
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Jacques Louis David
Portrait of the sisters Zénaïde & Charlotte Bonaparte
1821
oil on canvas
Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Jacques Louis David
Portrait of General Étienne Maurice Gérard, Marshal of France
1816
oil on canvas
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

George Dawe
Portrait of Charlotte, Empress of Russia, with her children
ca. 1821
oil on canvas
State Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg

Joseph Severn
miniature portrait of John Keats
early 19th century
oil on ivory
National Portrait Gallery, London

Adolphe Félix Cals
Portrait of a man
19th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Thomas Lawrence
Portrait of the Honorable Caroline Upton
ca. 1800
oil on canvas
Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, Massachusetts

François Gérard
Portrait of Mme Talleyrand-Périgord
ca. 1804
oil on canvas
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

François Gérard
Portrait of Prince Talleyrand-Périgord
1808
oil on canvas
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Vicente López Portaña
Portrait of Goya at age eighty
1826
oil on canvas
Prado, Madrid