Dating latest 1700s to very early 1800s, this rather Bacchanalian celebratory or allegory portrait miniature is set with a landscape in distance. That is a more typical positioning of portraits in about 1770s or slightly earlier. Interesting portrait is definitely of a living person in that era. Collectors now refer to bare-breasted paintings and snuff boxes as 'naughty' though in her time it was not so. The old snuff box is entirely made of ivory* and tortoise shell* and is from my collection of decades. Subject now to restrictions as noted below. Full measurements noted on the photos.
Very good to excellent condition for age and type, lined and trimmed with fine old red tortoise shell, bands of ivory. Painting in gouache on thin wafer, typical of the genre. I have never taken this painting out of its mount, and I can see a flashing chip on the interior of the convex cover glass at about the 8 o'clock position, which caught a lot of light in our photos, but isn't much visible at all to the naked eye. Very nicely preserved for age.
IMPORTANT NOTE regarding antique tortoise shell or ivory: We are great supporters of protection for endangered species in our modern world. We never buy or sell anything 100 years or newer; we donate to anti-poaching organizations; we don't hunt; we conserve in ways that impact global warming (we're totally solar at home), knowing those measures also protect the animals in the wild today. We also recognize the vast cultural history we preserve with our care and reverence for these antique objects, and agree with CITES that objects over 100 years of age have nothing whatsoever to do with species depletion in our current world.
Our offering exceeds the age limitation of "more than 100 years of age", and is well within the exemption for CITES regulation. If imported, met the CITES regulation. This item will be handled and shipped from our Utah business, and is not available for shipment internationally, nor within the USA to California, NY, Nevada, Hawaii, New Jersey, Oregon, Washington if it contains ivory, sorry. Please see our small print for more details.
