Lot 49: *JOSEPH WERNER (1637-1710)

oil on copper, heightened with gold Werner was born in Berne, Switzerland and trained first in Basel and then under Matthäus Merian in Frankfurt. Around 1654 he went to Rome where he made a name for himself as a fashionable painter of miniature portraits and allegories. Werner was summoned by Louis XIV to Paris where he continued to work as a portraitist. He often portrayed his sitters in the guise of gods and goddesses, such as in the present portrait. A Portrait of Louis XIV as Apollo in his Chariot is in the Musée du Château, Versailles (on vellum, inv. no. 6927,1).