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Empress Marie Louise
(18th and 19th Centuries )
A French inscription on the back of this miniature identifies the subject as "Marie Louise, Archduchess of Austria, Empress of the French, and Queen of Italy, painted by L. Mansion, [i.e. André-Léon Larue] 2 October 1812." The daughter of Francis I, Emperor of Austria, Marie-Louise (1791-1847) became Napoleon's second wife in 1810, after he divorced Joséphine de Beauharnais, who could not bear him children. After Napoleon's death in 1821, Marie Louise remarried twice. Mansion, a pupil of Jean-Baptiste Isabey, painted miniatures in both Paris and London. The sitter wears a red velvet dress embroidered with flowers, edged with white lace, a pearl necklace and earrings, and a gold diadem set with pearls.
Inscription
Provenance
Provenance (from the French provenir, 'to come from/forth') is the chronology of the ownership, custody, or location of a historical object.
William T. Walters, Baltimore [date and mode of acquisition unknown]; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1894, by inheritance; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.
Geographies
United Kingdom, England, London
(Place of Origin)
France, Paris (Place of Origin)
Measurements
H: 2 1/8 × W: 1 3/16 in. (5.4 × 3.05 cm)
Credit Line
Acquired by William T. Walters
Location in Museum
Not on view
Accession Number
In libraries, galleries, museums, and archives, an accession number is a unique identifier assigned to each object in the collection.
In libraries, galleries, museums, and archives, an accession number is a unique identifier assigned to each object in the collection.
38.2