François de Troy (Toulouse 1646 – 1730 Paris)

Pair of Portraits of an Elegant Man and Woman

oil on canvas
49 ½ x 38 ¼ inches each (126 x 97 cm.)

Provenance:
Private collection, Canada.

François de Troy was born in Toulouse in 1645.¹  He was taught the rudiments of painting  by his father, and probably also by the more accomplished regional painter Antoine Durand.  Some time after 1662 he moved to Paris to study with the portrait painter Claude Lefebvre and with Nicolas-Pierre Loir, whose sister-in-law, Jeanne Cotelle, he married in 1669.  Two yeas later he was approved by the Académie Royale and in 1674 was received as a history painter with a morceau de réception that depicted Mercury and Argus (Paris, École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts).  His known works of this period include tapestry designs for Madame de Montespan, mistress of Louis XIV, and several religious and mythological paintings.  Early in his career he became friendly with Roger de Piles, who first introduced him to Dutch and Flemish painting.  After Lefebvre’s death in 1675 de Troy dedicated himself to ortraiture in the hope of attracting the same clientele as his late teacher.  In 1679 he received his first important commission, for a portrait of the Swedish ambassador Nils Bielke, and a year later was commissioned for the portrait of Anne-Maire of Bavaria, the bride of the Grand Dauphin.  Following these successes, his clients included Madame de Montespan and her descendants, especially her son by Louis XIV, Louis –Auguste de Bourbon, Duc du Maine, and  his wife, as with the work Louise-Bénédicte de Bourbon, Duchesse du Maine; 1694; Sceaux, Château, Musée Ile de France).  Henceforward, De Troy worked continuously in court circles for nearly five decades and was highly praised for his ability to capture the nobility’s pre-occupation with manners, sartorial modes and social position.

By the mid 1690’s De Troy had acquired a reputation as a painter of women.  As Dézallier d’Argenville observed, women favored him for his ability to make them look beautiful.  A superb example is his portrayal of Anne-Marie de Bosmelet, Duchesse de la Force (1714; Rouen, Musée de beaux-arts), which is often considered his masterpiece.  The somewhat heavy features of the sitter in the Rouen painting are enhanced by shimmering silk draperies and the presence of an exotically garbed servant.  De Troy’s style derived in composition and palette from van Dyke, but was tempered by a French classicizing reserve and grandeur that still characterized the transitional period of the early 18th century.  During the Regency his most admired works were the mythological portraits in which he disguised his patrons as Olympian deities such as Venus and Ceres.  By using sensual costuming and attributes, he created an aura of charm and prettification without sacrificing the sitter’s individual likeness.  Mythological portrayals had existed previously, but his were novel in their combination of realism and sensuality, and therein provided important prototypes for the Rococo portraiture of Hubert Drouais and Jean-Marc Nattier.  His other important paintings for the court included Marie-Adélaïde of Savoy, bride of the Duc de Bourgogne (1697; Moscow, Puskin Museum of Fine Art); James Edward Stuart, pretender to the English throne (1700; Hannover, Niedersächsische Landesgalerie); and the Banquet of Dido and Aeneas (exhibited Salon 1704; Private Collection), a historiated portrait depicting more than forty members of the Duc and Duchesse du Maine’s family.

De Troy also executed portraits of the Parisian bourgeoisie.  Unlike his competitors and friends Hyacinthe Rigaud, who concentrated on painting for the court, and Nicolas de Largillierre, who painted almost exclusively for the bourgeoisie, he worked readily and frequently for both classes.  His portraits of the bourgeoisie, however, differ from those of the court in their greater naturalism, intimacy and reliance on Dutch rather than Flemish formulae.  For example, his Self-Portrait (circa 1702; Châlons-sur-Marne, Musée Garinet) derives its enframng window treatment from the works of Gerrit Dou and the
deep, shadowy lighting from Rembrandt.

Around 1700 De Troy began to produce northern-inspired group and family portraits, thus helping to initiate the popular 18th century subject of figures intimately arranged in contemporary settings, as in the Family of François de Troy (circa 1708-10; Versailles, Château, on depot Le Mans, Musée Tessé) and the Magistrate’s Family at Home ( circa 1722-5; Paris, Private Collection).  He also commemorated historical events such as the Peace of Utrecht of 1715 and the Peace of 1719 for the Echevins of the City of Paris. 

François de Troy received numerous honors.  He advanced in the hierarchy of the Académie, becoming Adjunct Professor in 1692, Professor in 1693, Director from 1708 to 1711 and Assistant Rector in 1722.  He participated in the Salons of 1699 and 1704, where he exhibited no less than 24  and 31 works respectively.  He ranks, moreover, among the best portrait painters of the late Baroque period, along with Rigaud and Largillierre, with whose works his own are often confused.  De Troy’s many students included André Boys, Alexis-Simon Belle and Drouais, as well as his son Jean-François de Troy.  François de Troy died in Paris in 1730.

The present works depict a man and woman in elegant late 17th century dress and are accented by their original period frames.  The woman is presented in a red draped  interior opening onto a formal garden accented with a dramatic flowing fountain.  She is dressed in opulent silk and brocade and rests her arm over the gilded mask handle of a flower-filled urn.  The man on the other hand is presented in the darkened interior of a library, again draped in flowing silk and his hand points to the page of an opened book.  The two portraits can be dated circa 1690-95.

The attribution to De Troy is accepted by Dominique Brême, who has examined these works in the original.