Ladies on sofas - six paintings... also, three dogs

 

Little White Dog, by Henri Lebasque, 1905.

The Pink Dress, by William Nicholson, 1934.

Madame Simone (the stage and pen name of Simone Le Bargy née Pauline Benda), by Henry Caro-Delvaille, 1908.

The Countess of Crawford and Balcarres, by Sir William Orpen, 1914.

 Elizabeth, Lady Webster, later Lady Holland, with her spaniel Pierrot, by Louis Gauffier, circa 1795.

Pierrot!

Woman Seated on a Sofa in an Interior, by Frederick Carl Frieseke, 1914.

Una cantatrice inglese a Venezia - a portrait of Mrs. Elizabeth Billington, by Louis Gauffier, 1795

 

The opera singer - also known for her abilities at the keyboard - is portrayed in an apartment overlooking the Piazzetta di San Marco in Venice.

Between marriages - her first husband had died the year before - she is barely clothed in the currently very fashionable - and very sheer - "Grecian" style.
(Some bold ladies were actually naked beneath these gowns, most wore pink or flesh-colored undergarments to give the illusion of nudity.)

I love this charming musical vignette. I'm also very intrigued by the rather crude foot pedal linked to the underside of the keyboard by a blue chord.

The figure leaning on the balustrade may represent an actual person or be just a compositional device. The winged "Lion of Venice" is seen atop its granite column.

The portrait is signed by Gauffier as having been completed in Florence, and the singer appears to have only been resident
in Naples and then, later, Florence during 1795. So it's possible the Venetian setting may have merely been imagined.

*

Elizabeth Billington (27 December 1765, London – 25 August 1818, Venice), British opera singer.

I don't know that I'd ever heard of Elizabeth Billington, but she has a surprisingly extensive - though rather awkwardly cobbled together - Wikipedia entry.

Les hommes, les hommes, toujours les hommes....

"Jean Kolitsch, 1909." Courtesy Ralf De Jonge.

Count Gustaf Mauritz Armfelt in Florence, by Louis Gauffier, 1793.

"Young Peasant Laughing", by Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller, 1840.

The artist Paul Victor Grandhomme, attributed to Raphaël Collin, circa 1870s.

Unknown, by Emile Legagneur, active 1892-1933. Courtesy Ralf De Jonge.

Prince Viktor Nikolaevich Gagarin, by Arturo Noci, 1907.

Portrait of a man (possible self-portrait), by Gilbert Stuart, circa 1782-9.

Portrait of a Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire (possibly Hekimoğlu Ali Pasha), by Jean-Étienne Liotard, circa 1738-43.

Jan Bernd Schaep, by Jurgen Ovens, circa 1650s.

Bela Lugosi, by Geza Kende, circa 1932.

Self-portrait, by Cedric Morris (later Sir Cedric Lockwood Morris, 9th Baronet), circa 1930.

Unknown, circa 1900-1920.

  "The Violin Student, Paris", by Stephen Seymour Thomas, 1891.

Godart Alexander Gerard Philip, Baron van der Capellen, by Cornelis Kruseman, circa 1816-20.

Frederick Douglass, 1848.

Portrait of a young man in a black suit, by Eduard Ritter, 1835.

Ernest Lee Major, by Samuel Burtis Baker, 1910.

Portrait of a young man, by François-Hubert Drouais, 1772.

Unknown, circa 1950s-early 60s.

Duke Ernst II of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha on his deathbed, unknown painter, circa 1893.

 Thomas Pope, later 3rd Earl of Downe, by William Larkin, circa 1615.

"Enrico" (?), by Arturo Noci, circa 1910-25. (I've been unable to find out more information on this portrait.)

"El marino Sánchez", Federico de Madrazo y Kuntz, 1843.

"Young Bacchus", by Sergei Solomko, 1884.

Adolfo Best Maugard, by Diego Rivera, 1913.

Lew Alcindor (later Kareem Abdul-Jabbar), by Richard Avedon, 1963.

Carlo IV Borromeo Arese, unknown Lombard painter, circa 1675.

Young man in a blue jacket, by Louis-Lié Périn-Salbreux, circa 1790. (Miniature.)

Self-portrait in a red coat, by George Romney, circa 1760.

German soldier, circa 1940-45. Courtesy Ralf De Jonge.

Portrait of a young man (possibly Alessandro de'Medici), by Jacopo Pontormo, circa 1526.

Carl, 3rd Prince of Leiningen, by Louis Ami Arlaud-Jurine, 1821. (Miniature.)

Portrait of a young man, by Jacob Ferdinand Voet, circa 1670s.

Maurice Chevalier, by Edward Steichen, 1929.