PORTRAIT OF THE EMPRESS MARIA LUDOVICA (1745–1792)
Artist Heinrich Friedrich Füger Heilbronn, 1751 – Vienna, 1818
Date ca. 1790
Object type painting Medium, technique oil on canvas Dimensions 206 × 140 cm Inventory number 95.4
Collection Old Master Paintings
On view Museum of Fine Arts, Second Floor, European Art 1700-1850, Gallery XXIX
The aristocratic appearance, the unruffled face and the noble bearing all suggest that the picture shows a ruler. At the age of twenty, Maria Ludovica married the Austrian archduke who was crowned Holy Roman Emperor, King of Hungary and Bohemia in 1790 as Leopold II.
The Empress’s appearance is airy and light, cool and sublime at the same time, suggesting that Füger was not untouched by the influence of traditional English portraiture.
The early death of the Empress and the painter’s incipient eye disease may be the reason why the painting remained unfinished, giving it an unintentionally impressionistic touch.
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