Gentleman in a Black Coat with a Black Bow Tie

Cécile Villeneuve painted this portrait of the dark-haired young man after a photographic original, a daguerreotype. She thus spared the client the tedious and protracted portrait sitting while shortening the painting process since the features of the person being portrayed could be rendered faster and more precisely. Conceivably, it was not only practical reasons that determined the choice of this method but also the client’s inability to visit the miniaturist. Perhaps the sitter lived far away or had died, and a person close to him commissioned Villeneuve to paint the portrait.
The artist did not conceal the use of the photographic original but rather noted the mechanical aid directly after her signature: “d’après Dag[uerréo]type”. The result is, in fact, somewhat lifeless. As a rule, the portraits that the miniaturist painted from nature are livelier and convey the impression that the sitter had an emotional life. Back then, the human eye and human empathy were still far superior to any machine. It was not until decades later that photographic portraits not only exhibited a greater external similarity with their subjects than did painted miniatures but were also superior in capturing a person’s essence due to the shorter exposure times.
B. P.