Jacques Albert Sénave (1758-1829): A portrait of a man in his study, oil on canvas, dated 1783

Dimensions:

Work: 69,5 x 55,4 cm

Frame: 89,5 x 75,5 cm

Inscribed with the sitter's age centre left (ÆTATIS XLVIII).

Jacques-Albert Sénave attended the painting academies in both Dunkirk and Saint Omer. In 1780, he came to Paris, where he studied onder Joseph Benoît Suvée (1743-1807) and Jacques Louis David (1748-1825). He was appointed Honorary Dean of the Painting Academy of Ypres in 1821.

The sitter of this distinctive portrait is unidentified, but the book to which the viewer is drawn by his pointed finger, does tell us something about the sitter's beliefs: in this well-known didactic poem, Alteaergeheimnissen of 1645, the Catholic convert Joost van den Vondel expounded the doctrine of the Eucharist.

Provenance:

Old Master Paintings, sold in Sotheby's Amsterdam, on the 5 May 2009, lot 101 (link).