317 - Paul Émile Chabas,

Paul Émile Chabas, French 1869-1937- Portrait of a lady wearing a white dress with a blue sash and a black plumed hat; oil on an octagonal canvas, signed 'Paul Chabas' (lower right, partially obscured), 100.5 x 74.5 cm. Provenance: Private Collection. Note: Chabas trained under William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905) and Tony Robert-Fleury (1837-1911), making his Salon debut in 1890. He enjoyed considerable success throughout his career, becoming one of France’s leading academic and portrait painters. He was elected to the Académie des Beaux-Arts in 1921, appointed a Chevalier of the Légion d’honneur in 1928, and served as president of the Société des Artistes Français from 1925 to 1935. Alongside his painting, Chabas also worked as an illustrator, producing illustrations for books by authors including Paul Bourget (1852-1935) and Alfred de Musset (1810-1857). The present work is a characteristic example of Chabas’s portraiture, demonstrating his sensitive handling of the sitter’s features and the textures of her dress and hat. A comparable portrait was sold at Sotheby’s, Paris, on 17 June 2015 for €6,500 (lot 125).