18th Century Oil - Mademoiselle de Charolais

A fine 18th-century portrait depicting the prominent Versailles courtier Louise Anne de Bourbon (1695–1758), known as Mademoiselle de Charolais. A French princess, she was the daughter of Louis III, Prince of Condé, and a granddaughter of King Louis XIV. As seen here, several surviving portraits by artists including Pierre Gobert and Charles-Joseph Natoire depict her dressed as a Franciscan friar. She was known to prefer this attire and to wear nothing underneath for the ease of her many lovers whom she visited in disguise. Such an unconventional choice of costume, adopting the habit of a male religious figure, was a strikingly transgressive departure from contemporary expectations of aristocratic female portraiture, reflecting the wit, theatricality, and playful irreverence for which she was renowned at the French court. Unsigned. Beautifully presented in an antique oval gilt frame. On canvas.