The Heckscher Museum of Art’s collection spans 500 years with particular emphasis on art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. American landscape painting and work by Long Island artists, past and present, are particular strengths, as is American and European modernism.
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Portrait of a Lady, presumed to be the Marquise de La Ferriere
Like many turn-of-the-century private collections, The Heckscher bequest included a number of old master portraits. Notable among them is Nicolas de Largillièrre's lovely Portrait of a Lady. Born in Paris, but raised in Antwerp, Largillièrre learned his craft at the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke before working in London for several years as a restorer and assistant to a decorative painter. By 1679 anti-Catholic persecution there forced his return to Paris, where he was introduced to Louis XIV's court painter, Charles Le Brun, with whom he found favor. As a result, Louis sat for a portrait by Largillièrre, as did other members of the royal family. By the time Largillièrre was accepted into the prestigious Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture in 1683, he was a popular portraitist in court circles and had begun receiving numerous commissions from the provincial aristocracy and wealthy bourgeoisie as well. His output was prodigious; he produced well over a thousand portraits throughout his career, as well as several decorative still lifes and landscapes, some religious works, and several large municipal commemorative group portraits. Late in life, Largillièrre became director of the Académie Royale. The identity of the subject in the Heckscher painting is unknown. She is presumed to be the Marquise de La Ferrière, based on a description in a 1913 sales catalogue, but no documentary evidence exists to prove this identification. The sitter certainly is aristocratic and elegant. She wears silk and lace, and her dress and hair are in fashionable late-seventeenth century mode. The painting is executed with the warm palette of the Flemish tradition that Largillièrre had learned in Antwerp. With only a hint of landscape in the background, the presentation is intimate, the sitter enclosed by the oval frame and directly engaging the viewer.