Portrait of a Young Woman

This Portrait of a Young Woman at the Fogg Museum, painted around 1800, dates from the period of the Consulate when David was rebuilding his career after the Terror, during which he had been briefly imprisoned. The unidentified sitter wears the classicizing fashion of the Directory period — the simple white muslin dress and classical hairstyle that had replaced the elaborate powdered wigs and silk brocades of the ancien régime. David's austere oil technique, rejecting Rococo softness in favor of clear, sculptural handling, was applied with particular sensitivity to the portrayal of this young woman's direct gaze and composed bearing. The simple white dress and unadorned hairstyle create an image of republican elegance that itself carries political meaning — this was what enlightened femininity looked like in the new France that had rejected aristocratic artifice. The Fogg Museum at Harvard holds this among its important French paintings, preserving it as an example of how David's portraiture served the social values of each successive political regime he served.

The simple white dress and unadorned hairstyle create an image of republican elegance. David's line is characteristically firm and clear, defining the young woman's features with the precision of a draftsman who never lost his commitment to drawing as the foundation of painting.