GEORG FRIEDRICH SCHMIDT

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• Self-Portrait of Maurice-Quentin de la Tour, French Pastellist: Larger Plate 1742
  
  etching and engraving on laid paper; sheet: 493 x 363 mm (19 3/8 x 14 5/16 inches)
  
  Jacoby 50; Wessely 55 third (final) state
  
  PROVENANCE
  Charles M. Lea, Philadelphia (Lugt 1662a)
  Philadelphia Museum of Art (acc. no. 28-42-3225)
  de-accessioned in 2017

  A very good impression; in very good condition, with small margins all round.

• Self-Portrait of Maurice-Quentin de la Tour, French Pastellist: Smaller Plate 1772
  
  etching and engraving on laid paper; sheet: 330 x 249 mm (13 x 9 13/16 inches)
  
  Jacoby 89; Wessely 56 second (final) state
  
  PROVENANCE
  Philadelphia (Lugt 1662a)
  Philadelphia Museum of Art (acc. no. 1974-179-270)
  de-accessioned in 2017
  
  

• Portrait of the Artist's Wife 1753
  
  etching on laid paper; sheet 158 x 132 mm (6 3/16 x 5 3/16 inches)
  
  Jacoby 135; Wessely 105 second (final) state
  
  PROVENANCE
  Charles M. Lea, Philadelphia (Lugt 1662a)
  Philadelphia Museum of Art (acc. no. 1928-42-3248)
  de-accessioned in 2017

  A very good impression with margins all round.

• Portrait of Count Ivan Ivanovich Shuvalov (after Louis-Jean-François Lagrenée) 1762
  
  etching on laid paper; plate 208 x 162 mm (8 1/8 x 6 3/8 inches);
  
  Jacoby 143; Wessely 108 second (final) state
  
  PROVENANCE
  Charles M. Lea, Philadelphia (Lugt 1662a)
  Philadelphia Museum of Art (acc. no. 1928-42-3252)
  de-accessioned in 2017

  Superb impression, printing with subtle plate tone; in excellent condition, with small margins all round.

  Count Shuvalov (1727-1797) was Russia's first Minister of Education and a seminal figure of Russia's Enlightenment who corresponded regularly with the leading French thinkers of the period, among them Helvetius, d'Alembert, Diderot, and Voltaire. He initiated the founding of theaters and universities as well as the Academy of Arts. The latter started out in his own palace in Saint Petersburg in 1757 as Academy of Three Noble Arts before it was ultimately transformed into the Imperial Academy of Arts.

  Schmidt was invited to establish a school of engraving within the academy. His sensitive portrait etching is based on a drawing by Lagrenée and was created during Shuvalov's penultimate year as the academy's first president.