Fanny Laurent Fleury, 1848 – 1920/40

PORTRAIT OF A GIRL BY A CHERRY TREE Oil on canvas. 54.7 x 38 cm. Signed lower right. In carved decorative frame. A young girl stands in the shade of two large cherry trees on a sunny spring day. The simple but neat clothing and the stern and honest gaze towards the viewer convey a calm, gentle and quiet atmosphere. With her hands, she reaches for a branch of the cherry tree, perhaps to pick or smell the blossoming flowers. The background opens up with a wide perspective of the fields and meadows of the French countryside. Fleury's portraits and genre paintings are generally realistic and occasionally romantic, but it is the compositions based on carefully considered color harmonies, like this one, that stand out. The present painting is a serene image in which the subject becomes a pretext for the interplay of greens, mauves and pinks. The gesture and spontaneity of the girl depicted emphasize the fact that this is not a portrait in the sense of a representative painting, but a decorative design inspired by the works of Edouard Manet. (1401487) (19)