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FEDERICO ZANDOMENEGHI , VENICE, 1841 - PARIS, 1917 The Reader Oil on canvas 27 x 22 cm Captivated by her reading, this young girl leans attentively into her book, unaware of any outside view. Sitting on a low chair in the middle of a garden, she offers us her graceful profile. With her short summer dress, belted with a bow at the waist and embellished with a sailor collar, her patent pumps and black stockings, this teenager belongs to the upper middle class. Her long red hair, held in a small bun at the top of her head, falls naturally to her shoulders. Her pose, though intimate and natural, retains the poise and restraint of her social milieu. This young girl in bloom, whom Marcel Proust might have met in the gardens of the Champs-Elysées, occupies the entire composition. A portrait of an age in life rather than a specific person, this young woman belongs to an iconographic tradition of women reading, which combines idleness with study and reflects female education in her cultured environment. A palette of tawny colours, predominantly orange like her hair, is matched by a jerky brushstroke that sets the composition ablaze with small hatchings like so many flames that irradiate this open-air scene with a sunny light. Impressionist in its construction, this portrait bears witness to the legacy of Renoir and Degas in their celebration of the female figure. Federigo Zandomeneghi (1841-1917) was an Italian painter. He was born and raised in Venice in a family of artists and trained at the Venice Academy from 1856. In 1860, as a supporter of Garibaldi, he stayed in Florence where he frequented the Macchiaioli group (tachists) who had a lasting influence on his style. In their company, he devoted himself to landscape painting on the ground, 'en plein air'. This innovative approach, which gave their compositions a realistic rendering, found its equivalent, at the same time, in France, with the painters of the Barbizon school. In 1874, Zandomeneghi went to Paris where he decided to settle. He spent the rest of his life there. His second decisive encounter was with the Impressionists who had just held their first exhibition. Zandomeneghi participated in four of their exhibitions (1879, 1880, 1881 and 1886). At first he had to make illustrations for fashion magazines to earn a living, but his meeting in 1878 with the art dealer Paul Durand-Ruel, who bought him the exclusive rights to his works, gave him economic independence. At the beginning of the 1890s, he found a new impetus in the pastel technique, producing numerous portraits. His paintings sold as far away as the United States, bringing him fame and financial ease. Provenance: Durand-Ruel, Paris, no. 3254 (acquired from the artist); Private collection; Sotheby's sale, Milan, 20 June 2005, lot no. 142; Acquired at this sale by the father of the present owner, Then by descent to the present owner Private collection, Europe. Enrico Piceni, Zandomeneghi, Bramante edition, Milan, 1967, no. 58. Enrico Piceni, Zandomeneghi, Bramante edition, Milan, 1991, no. 58. Enrico Piceni Foundation, Federico Zandomeneghi, general catalogue, Milan, 2006, new updated and expanded edition, Libri Scheiwiller edition, pp. 151 and 320, no. 560 (ill. LXXV). Signatur: Signed and dated lower left 'Zandomeneghi'