La Coiffe blanche

A young woman in the simple indoor costume of the 1770s is shown from the chest up, her hair gathered beneath an ample white mob cap tied with a small blue bow, a translucent scarf crossed over her shoulders above a striped bodice; the handling is quick and the light soft, the face turned slightly away in a moment of quiet inwardness. Signed and dated 1774, this is the brossée study Nicolas-Bernard Lépicié made after the same model who inspired the figure of the young mother in his Famille du menuisier, the reworking of the Atelier du menuisier exhibited at the Salon of 1775 in the direction of virtue and duty. The painting is held in the Musée Cognacq-Jay, le goût du XVIIIe, Paris.