Madame David

Bequeathed in 1826 by the sitter, Marguerite-Charlotte David, née Pécoul [1764-1826],[1] to her daughter, Baronne Claude-Marie Meunier, née Laure-Emilie-Félicité David [1786-1863], Calais;[2] her daughter-in-law, Baronne Jules Meunier, née Pauline Derode [1824-1903], Calais; the artist's great-granddaughter, Mme. Marius Bianchi, née Mathilde Jeanin, by 1913;[3] her daughter, Caroline-Pauline-Thérèse, Comtesse Joachim Murat [1870-1940], by 1930;[4] her sister, Renée, vicomtesse de Fleury [1869-1948]; (Pierre Cailleux, Paris), 1948-1953.[5] Jointly owned from 1953 by (Otto Wertheimer [Galerie les Tourettes], Paris) and (M. Knoedler & Co., Inc., New York);[6] sold 1954 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[7] gift 1961 to NGA. [1] In a chronological list of his works which David drew up in about 1815 ("Liste B"), _Madame David_ figures in next-to-last place as "Le portrait de Me David mon épouse" (Schnapper, Antoine, et al., _Jacques-Louis David 1748-1825_, exh. cat. Louvre and Versailles, Paris, 1989: 20). [2] Mme David's last will, dated 6 March 1826 (Paris, Archives Nationales, Minutier Central, CVIII, 1013; Wildenstein, Daniel, and Guy Wildenstein, _Documents complémentaires au catalogue de l'oeuvre de Louis David_, Paris, 1973: 239, no. 2045), and the posthumous inventory of her possessions, dated 27 June 1826 (CVIII, 1014; Wildenstein and Wildenstein 1973: 247, no. 2071; Schnapper et al. 1989: 636), both mention this portrait and indicate that it had been bequeathed to Baronne Emilie Meunier, her daughter. [3] _David et ses elèves_, Petit Palais, Paris, 1913: no. 56. [4] Richard Cantinelli, _Jacques-Louis David_, Paris, 1930: 113, no. 132. [5] The painting was lent by Cailleux to the 1952-1953 exhibition _Meisterwerke de französichen Malerei von Poussin bis Ingres_, shown at the Kunsthalle, Hamberg, and the Alter Pinakothek, Munich. [6] M. Knoedler & Co. Records, accession number 2012.M.54, Research Library, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles: Stock book no. 10, p. 115, no. A5477, and Sales book no. 17, both as _Portrait of Mme David_ (copies in NGA curatorial files). [7] See The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1314.