Diana

Born in Berlin, Thienpondt was a pupil of Antoine Pesne (1683–1757) from 1745, and he took up miniature painting in 1751. In 1753 he went to Dresden to study with Ismael Mengs (1688–1764). He later settled in Warsaw, where he was much sought after as a miniaturist in enamel, and he died there. Three of his portrait miniatures are in Berlin (Irene Geismeier and Bernd Burock, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin: Miniaturen 16.–19. Jahrhundert, Berlin, 1986, nos. m619–21, ill.).

This work is a companion piece to A Sea Nymph (24.80.520) and was painted by the same hand, perhaps about 1760. The attribution to Carl Friedrich Thienpondt was made by Hermione Waterfield in 1978 (unpublished opinion in Department of European Paintings files).

These two enamels are characterized by an elaborate pointillé technique, in which the smallest dots model the flesh tones and the largest give an overall texture to the background. A very bright pink is used for emphatic highlights. They are fine examples of German Rococo style and taste.

[2016; adapted from Reynolds and Baetjer 1996]

Mary Clark Thompson, New York and Canandaigua, N.Y. (until d. 1923)

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "European Miniatures in The Metropolitan Museum of Art," November 5, 1996–January 5, 1997, no. 103.

Graham Reynolds with the assistance of Katharine Baetjer. European Miniatures in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1996, pp. 10, 13, 119–20, no. 103, colorpl. 103 and ill. p. 119, call the pendants "fine examples of German Rococo style and taste".