Portrait of Marie-Anne Herlédan

Van den Anker studied at the Academy in Rotterdam before moving to France and settling in Paris. He later spent fourteen years in Pont-Aven, where he painted exteriors and figures. Here, he depicts a quintessential Breton woman from the neighbouring town of Riec-sur-Belon. Marie-Anne Herledan (1815-1889) wears a Pont-Aven headdress and traditional clothing. The portrait was commissioned by the model’s son, who wished to honour his mother with this formal portrait in a handsome gilded frame. This canvas illustrates the artist’s talent as well as his connection to the realist tradition of the great 17th-century Dutch portraitists