Lot 106 Dα

Eugène Fichel, who worked as an actor as well as a painter to pay his way, studied art at the Paris academy as of 1841. After initially focussing on narrative and religious subjects, he later began to paint genre and interior scenes set in the past. His preferred source of motifs was the 18th century, which also forms the subject of this finely painted work. The tapestry in the background of the piece, showing Venus in the forge of Vulcan, was used again in a work painted seven years later showing a concert in a similar interior, which was sold by Christie's of London in 2005.