Lionel ROYER (1852-1926). Young Woman with a Garland of Field Flowers. Unsigned oil on canvas. Height : 55 cm - Width : 46 cm Provenance: artist's family, then private collection. Note: At the Ecole des Beaux-Arts de Paris, where Lionel Royer was enrolled, he was a pupil of Alexandre Cabanel (1823-1889) and William Bouguereau (1825-1905), both considered major exponents of academic painting in the Second Empire and late 19th century. He went on to become a renowned portraitist of the Parisian elite. For twenty years, his portraits of women, with their sure drawing, pleasant coloring and aristocratic style, placed the artist at the pinnacle of academicism. But above all, he was a painter of history, a commentator on his time.