The Toilette of Esther

1841

Oil on canvas, 45.5 × 35.5 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris

Two attendants help the Biblical heroine Esther prepare to be presented to the Persian king Ahasuerus. This small cabinet picture was painted when Chassériau was still in his early twenties.

Shown at the Salon of 1842.
Look at the pale, cleanly outlined body set between the deep blue robe at left, the red-orange dress at right, and the sky and trees behind.
A pencil study for the painting is also in the Louvre.
Chassériau, a pupil of Ingres, keeps his teacher's firm contour on the body but gives the robes and jewels the strong color linked with Delacroix. The two rival camps meet in one Eastern beauty scene.
Baron Arthur Chassériau bequeathed it to the Louvre in 1934.

Image: Wikimedia Commons · Public domain (PD-Art)