Portrait of a girl

Albert Anker's 'Portrait of a Girl' (1885) belongs to his many sympathetic depictions of Swiss children — a subject that was central to his reputation and that he approached with the same combination of technical mastery and genuine affection that characterized all his best work. Anker's children are specific individuals rather than generic types, their particular faces and expressions observed with care. His portraits of girls were especially admired for their combination of freshness and dignity — the subjects treated as fully present individuals rather than as decorative accessories.

Anker renders the girl's face with his characteristic warm, naturalistic precision — the specific features, the quality of the skin, and the individual expression observed with the care he brought to all his portrait subjects. His warm, golden palette gives the portrait an atmosphere of gentle light appropriate to both the subject's youth and his affectionate relationship to it. The background is typically simple, all attention focused on the face.