Lot 314: JOSEPH HIPPOLYTE LEQUEUTRE (FRENCH, 1793-1877)

JOSEPH HIPPOLYTE LEQUEUTRE (FRENCH, 1793-1877)
Marie-Caroline (1798-1870) Duchesse de Berry, née Princess Caroline of Naples and Sicily, seated on fur-bordered green drape, in royal blue velvet dress with ermine-trimmed sleeves, gem-set brooch at corsage, wearing pearl necklace and bracelet, her upswept hair partly covered by gold-bordered white headscarf, gem-set tiara, holding a fan in her right hand; green curtain and landscape background with swans on a lake
signed 'Lequeutre' (upper left and lower-right)
on ivory
oval, 4 13/16 in. (122 mm.) high, heavy rectangular ormolu easel-stand frame, the spandrels decorated with crowned initals MC flanked by lilies, the strapwork border hung with garlands, the base with an angel at devotions, surmounted with the coat-of-arms of the Duke of Berry and the Royal Arms of the Two Sicilies, the strut engraved 'Alph. Giroux à Paris'

B. Hofstetter, 'Les miniaturistes de la duchesse de Berry' in Marie Caroline de Berry, Paris, 2002, p. 154 (as 'certainly the most beautiful 'late' portrait miniature' [of her]).

Caroline of Naples of Sicily (1798-1870), Duchesse de Berry.
Christie's, Geneva, 14 November 1978, lot 174.
Robert D. Brewster (1916-1995) Collection, New York; Sotheby's, Geneva, 15 November 1995, lot 339.