Coral & Copper

The artist has successfully captured this young lady’s modesty seen in her chaste smile and bashful gaze. Possibly still in her teens, she wears a gorgeous décolleté coral silk dress over a white slip and has a midnight blue wrap draped over one shoulder. Her dark hair has been twisted back from her face and falls over her back in loose curls.

Painted in oil on copper at the turn of the seventeenth century and perhaps intended as a portrait to be exchanged with her intended, the artist is yet to be rediscovered. In fine condition, it is housed in what appears to be the original silver gilt frame with spiral cresting and solid reverse.