Jean-Étienne Liotard worked as a portrait painter in many European cities including Vienna, London and Amsterdam. His most famous portraits include the great one of Richard Pococke (1738-1739), that of the Turkish Lady with Servant living life in the grand style (1742-1743) and that of François Tronchin (1757) proudly presenting his Rembrandt painting. However, it was his matchless Chocolate Girl that brought him real fame.

 

Jean-Marc Nattier (1685-1766) was a pupil of his father. In 1717 he created his thematically dark painting The Battle of Lesnaya, and by 1718 he had become a member of the Académie, but was not appointed professor there until 1752. Nattier concerned himself for many years with ornithological themes before turning to painting with pastels and causing a sensation with his extremely delicate portraits of women. Amongst these are the portrait of Marie Leszczynska, Queen of France, Reading the Bible and the Portrait of a Lady (c. 1750). This earned him the reputation of a courteous painter of ladies. In addition, Nattier is regarded as the inventor of the “portrait histoire”.

 

Another of the great pastel artists was Jean-Baptiste Perronneau (c. 1715-1783), who was always to some extent in the shadow of Delatour. He is indeed one of the genre artists, depicting the customs, morals and manners of the age. He also created portraits in oils before turning to pastels. He exhibited between 1746 and 1779 in the Salon, where he had a confrontation with Delatour, when the latter exhibited a self-portrait and Perronneau a portrait of the artist for which he had modelled himself. But also well known are his Portrait of Sara Hinloopen (mid-18th century) and the portrait of Madame de Sorquainville. Perronneau died in Amsterdam, completely forgotten.

 

In addition to Rosalba Carriera, another of the important women who painted in pastels was the French portrait painter Élisabeth-Louise Vigée-Le Brun (1755-1842), a daughter of the rather little-known painter Louis Vigée (1715-1767), who worked at almost all the European courts and was inundated everywhere with commissions. Despite her rapid style of painting, her work was always in the spirit of the 18th century, and her self-portrait (1789) with her daughter is a monument to radiant maternal happiness that exerts an irresistible charm on anyone who beholds it.