Portrait of Léonie Rose Charbuy-Davy

Painted in Paris in 1887, this portrait belongs to Van Gogh's transformative two-year stay in the French capital, where he encountered Impressionism and Neo-Impressionism and radically brightened his palette. The identity of the sitter Léonie Rose Charbuy-Davy is uncommon in Van Gogh scholarship; she may have been a model from his social circle in Montmartre. Van Gogh painted numerous portraits in Paris as he worked to develop a more colourful, expressive approach to the human figure, using his sitters as tests for new colour combinations and techniques absorbed from the Impressionists around him.

Small, mosaic-like brushstrokes in varied hues — characteristic of the Pointillist influence Van Gogh absorbed in Paris — animate the background. The face is rendered with more blended, attentive strokes, creating a focal warmth amid the vibrant surrounding colour. Complementary contrasts in the background heighten the sitter's presence.