Johann Anton de Peters (Cologne 1725-1795) A young lady at her toliet, brushing her hair in the mirrorJohann Anton de Peters (Cologne 1725-1795)A young lady at her toliet, brushing her hair in the mirror oil on canvas79.1 x 63.2cm (31 1/8 x 24 7/8in).ProvenanceGraf Andrassy, Budapest Prof. Dr. H.F. Secker, CologneAlbert Otten (Ottenheimer) (1886 – 1985), Cologne, later Engelwood New JerseyOn loan to the Portland Museum of Art, Maine (1986 – 2001)Leslie and Mildred Otten, Maine until 2002 when offeredSale, Sotheby's, London, 10 July 2002, lot 81 ExhibitedPortland Museum of Art, Maine. A Passion for Art: The Albert Otten Collection, 1987-88, no. 55LiteratureU. Thieme, F. Becker, Allgemeines Lexicon der Bildenen Künstler, Leipzig, 1932, vol. XXVI, p. 480 (as Mädchen am Frisiertisch, ihr Haar kämmend)Hans F. Secker in Weltkunst, 1 July 1950, p.2. Hella Robels 'Neues über das Leben und die Werke Anton de Peters', Wallraff-Richarz-Jahrbuch XXXIV, Cologne 1972, p.305.85 (as not by de Peters) W.H. Gerdts, A Passion for Art. The Albert Otten collection, Maine, Portland Museum of Art, exh. cat., 1987-88. pp. 5-6. ill, p.27. cat. 55, ill. De Peters is best remembered for his genre, mythological and religious works painted in France where he trained, and a number of the latter still hang in churches in Paris and Liège. The present work, however, displays an intimacy and understanding between artist and subject that suggests it is a portrait, most probably of his wife; in fact the same model appears in a watercolour and various drawings now in the collection of the Wallraf-Richartz Museum, Cologne. A version of this composition appeared on the London auction market attributed to de Peters (Sotheby's, 22 April 2009, lot 184). Albert Otten (previously Ottenheimer) was a steel magnate who made his fortune in Germany in the 1920s, but witnessing the rise of the Nazi party he emigrated to the United States in the 1930s. He was a notable collector of paintings, initially German works but expanding his collection into 19th and 20th century European paintings with a particular concentration on the Impressionists.