PIERRE-ALEXANDER WILLE
“Close Conversation”
A high quality oil on canvas 18th Century painting by Pierre_Alexander Wille (1748-1821) of an interior scene with an elderly gentleman and a young woman, presumably Father and Daughter.
Works by this artist often sell for very high prices at auction. Some examples are included at the end of the photos.
Frame: Presented in an antique decorative giltwood frame from a similar period.
Signature: Very indistinct, lower right.
Provenance: UK Private Collection
Condition: Frame is in excellent condition. Painting displays some general thinning and has some visible fine craquelure. There are scattered areas of over-touching throughout.
Measurements: Painting measures 55 x 46cm and the overall frame 71 x 63cm.
Biography: Pierre-Alexandre Wille , known as “Wille the son”, was born on 19 July 1748 in Paris and was a French genre painter.
Son of the engraver Jean-Georges Wille, Pierre-Alexandre was initiated into art in his father’s studio. Accredited by the Academy on June 25, 1774, he took part in most of the Salons as well as in certain exhibitions of the Salon de la Correspondance in 1775, 1777, 1779, 1781, 1783, 1785, 1787 and 1819.
The French Revolution ruined both Father and Son. His wife became mad as a result of a 12 year sickness and was enclosed at the royal house of Charenton. Wille, who was then 72 years old, had to solicit the help of the Duchess of Angoulême in 1821 to pay his wife’s pension. He himself probably ended his life in misery in some hospital. He died in 1821.
Wille drew the portrait of his father (1774), the portrait of his mother, Marie-Louise Deforge (1774), his own portrait (1773), the portrait of Madame Wille, that of Georges-Jacques Danton which was exhibited in 2015 at the Museum of the Conciergerie in Paris.