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At the end of a long life, Antoine Vaudoyer could look back with pride on his diplomatic successes as the doyen of architectural theory in France and of the administration of public buildings in Paris, as professor at the academy as well at his own architecture school in the Louvre, and not least as the founder of a dynasty of architects bearing his name. His own architectural projects were numerous and prestigious, but largely limited to renovations and expansions of pre-existing buildings. This is in contrast to a surviving body of visionary architectural drawings that testify to his creativity and artistic self-immersion.
With his large-format works, Vaudoyer belonged to the avantgarde of neoclassicism in France, whose beginnings bore the impress of the radical theories of Etienne L. Boullée (1728- 1799)
This rare portrait study is a thematic exception in the artist’s oeuvre of drawings. Nonetheless, it persuades with its loose brushstrokes and painterly application of wash, the penetration of the young woman’s personality in spite of the strict profile. The hasty vision of a small avenue or pergola below heightens the spontaneity of this loving study, which was made on the reverse of an architectural drawing.