Etching, 1762-1763.

I. 12.6 x 14.7 cm, S. 13.5 x 15.7 cm.

Baudicour 17.

Lagrenée came from a prominent family of artists. His father Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée (1724-1805) won the Prix de Rome (he worked in Rome intermittently during the 1750s) and was elected early in his career by unanimous vote to the Académie Royale. His reputation caught the attention of Elizabeth Petrovna, Empress of Russia, who, in 1760, appointed him to the offices of the director of the Imperial Academy of Arts and that of her principal court painter. Like his father, Jean Jacques, who was the youngest of several siblings--all of whom were artists, also worked for a time in Rome as well as Russia. Jean Jacques was also an accomplished and innovative printmaker who during the early part of his career created some sixty etchings, only to cease printmaking for several decades and resume during the 1780s with experiments into different forms of the wash technique. The current etching dates from his early career and shows the influence of 17th century painter-printmakers, notably Rembrandt.

PROVENANCE
The collection of Engineer and Major Frank Bensow (1883-1969), with the ink stamp verso (Lugt 982c).