Jean auguste dominique ingres (montauban 1780 - 1867 paris)
portrait of alphonse gérard, comte de rayneval
pencil;
signed, inscribed and dated, in pencil, lower right: ingres del. / a madame / bertin de vaux / 1844. 325 by 238 mm; 12⅞ by 9⅜ in. This lively portrait by ingres depicts alphonse gérard, comte de rayneval (1813-1858), who was first secretary at the french embassy in rome while ingres was still the director of the villa medici (1834-1841). 1 alphonse de rayneval, who had a brief and brilliant career as a diplomat, was assigned the post of french ambassador to naples and spain. At the beginning of 1844, rayneval was appointed first secretary and chargé d'affaires in saint petersburg and in march, the month before his departure for russia, he allied himself to the bertin family by marrying louise bertin de vaux, to whom ingres dedicated the present portrait. Louise bertin de vaux was the daughter of général auguste bertin de vaux and the granddaughter of louis-françois bertin de vaux, who was, with his brother, director of the journal des débats. Ingres's portrait drawing of the newly married young comtesse de rayneval dates, like that of her husband, from 1844. 2 she was thirteen years younger than her husband and died in paris in 1909. Another fascinating link between ingres and the rayneval family is that the comte's sister, mlle constance de rayneval, was the inspiration for the muse in ingres's celebrated portrait of the composer cherubini, in the louvre. 3
the present portrait must have been made during a brief parisian sojourn of rayneval, between late january and early february of 1844, after ingres had finally settled in paris. 1. A version of lesser quality of the same sitter, with differences, the authenticity of which is doubted, was in the collection saint-seine at villepreux. Naef, op. Cit. , vol. Iii, pp. 346-347, reproduced fig. 5, and vol. V, cat. 395
2. Naef, op. Cit. , vol. V, cat. 396, reproduced fig. 396
3. Paris, musèe du louvre, inv. R. F. 5423. Date: 1844.
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