Jacques-Louis David

Probably Baron Alquier;

His sale, Paris, 27 June 1825, lot 80 (?);

Collection Robinson, Rokeby Hall, Dunleer;

Anonymous sale, Sotheby's, London, 24 June 1978, lot 22;

Anonymous sale, Christie's, New York, 22 May 1997, lot 5;

Anonymous sale, Christie's, London, 5 December 1997, lot 275;

Private Collection, La Jolla, California;

Anonymous sale, Christie's, New York, 24 January 2008, lot 98;

Where acquired by the present owner.

M. Florisoone, David. Exposition en l'honneur du deuxième centenaire de sa naissance, exh. cat. Orangerie des Tuileries-musée du château, Paris-Versailles 1948, under no. M.O. 55 (?);

A. Sérullaz, Inventaire général des dessins. Ecole française. Dessins de Jacques-Louis David 1748-1825, Paris 1991, p. 165, under no. 205 (?);

P. Rosenberg and L.-A. Prat, Jacques-Louis David, 1748-1825 : catalogue raisonné des dessins, Milan 2002, tome I, p. 314, no. 336;

P.-J. Chalençon, Napoléon. La collection, Paris 2019, p. 86.

David only met Pius VII once, when the pope was in Paris between 1804 and 1805 to attend the coronation ceremony. David wanted to record his facial features in pencil, since Pius was to figure prominently in the painting he was preparing, The Consecration of the Emperor Napoleon I and the coronation of Empress Josephine in the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris, 2 December 1804 (Musée du Louvre). David would also paint Pius VII in a very fine portrait commissioned by Napoleon (Musée du Louvre).

David was undoubtedly touched by the pope’s personality and simplicity. He treasured the memory of this encounter and never forgot the pope’s intelligent expression, which had impressed him. This explains the number of portraits of Pius VII that David drew much later from memory. Prat and Rosenberg (2002, op. cit.) list six, produced during his exile in Brussels. There are others, some of which have reappeared in auctions later than 2002.