Monsieur Sarasin

Nattier's 1734 portrait of Monsieur Sarasin, in the Musée des Beaux-Arts de la Ville de Paris (Petit Palais), is an unusual subject for an artist so defined by female aristocratic portraiture. Sarasin was likely a bourgeois professional or minor functionary rather than a great noble or military figure, and his portrait represents Nattier's work outside the court sphere that usually defined his practice. Male portraiture of this type — a simple three-quarter bust without mythological apparatus or grand setting — required Nattier to rely on straightforward characterisation and technical quality rather than the decorative conceit that animated his female commissions. The Petit Palais's collection of Parisian art history provides appropriate context.

Without mythological costume, exotic accessories, or allegorical attributes, Nattier's male portrait technique stands or falls on characterisation alone. The face is rendered with his characteristic luminous flesh tones applied to a male subject, the coat described with the broad, fluid brushwork he brought to all his drapery, and the expression given the quiet authority appropriate to a respectable professional.