Robert

Léopold Robert (Swiss, 1794-1835)
Portrait of an Elderly Woman
Oil on canvas
26 x 21 ¼ inches (66 x 54 cm)

In 1810, Robert began as an engraver in Paris with his Swiss compatriot Charles Girardet, attending the Academy des Beaux-Arts and Jacques-Louis David’s studio. After David’s exile from Paris, Robert studied briefly with Baron Gros and then returned to Switzerland. Roulet de Mezerac’s generosity enabled Robert to visit Italy in 1818, after which trip, he devoted himself entirely to painting.

Once in Rome, Robert befriended Jean Victor Schnetz, François Joseph Navez and François Marius Granet, who were to exercise a profound influence on him. The famous “Robbers of Sonino,” were brought to Rome in 1819 and imprisoned in the Castel San Angelo, serving as Robert’s models. He exhibited regularly at the Salon from 1822 until 1835. He produced enumerable small folkloric canvasses of robbers, shepherds and Pifferari, acquired eagerly by patrons.

Leopold Robert was deeply affected by the suicide of his elder brother, who slit his throat in 1825 and again by the death of his mother in 1828. These events no doubt left him with a profound psychological problem, which was to result in his own suicide in 1835.

This amazingly sensitive portrait circa 1820, has been attributed to as widely stylistically different painters as Gericault, Delacroix and Millet: Gericault, because the woman has affinities with his studies of the insane; Delacroix, because of the supreme skill in the paint surface and Millet, because he painted much later portraits of old ladies. There is certainly a similarity in the stylistic affinities of the first two painters who were influenced by the Jacques Louis David and Baron Gros.

Charlotte Gere first suggested an attribution to Robert, supported by a number of other academics. There is a strong similarity in the physical features of the face with the portrait of his mother dated 1813.