Interior portrait

The interior portrait should not be confused with what is called a "conversation piece" in England; a term which designates a scene with a group of people engaged in some activity and often placed outdoors.

The first historically important example of the interior portrait represents a small art gallery set up by the Empress Josephine at Malmaison in 1812.

These new "middle-classes" were also eager to copy aristocratic tastes and industrialization made a much wider variety of furniture easily affordable.

Finally, decorative styles were constantly being changed and resurrected, so interior portraits were a way of preserving one's memories and bequeathing them to the next generation.

[2] Queen Victoria was very fond of these portraits as they allowed her to give the public a look at her loving family life and the comforts of home in a tasteful manner.

Most of the surviving examples are anonymous and rarely of high quality, but they often have a charm that compensates for what they lack in technical expertise.

The Polish Count Artur Potocki, for example, travelled widely, painting watercolors of the hotel rooms and other places where he stayed, from Rome to London.

With only a few exceptions, such as Jean-Baptiste Isabey and Eugène Lami of France, architect John Nash and furniture-maker Thomas Sheraton (both of England), few artists who dealt exclusively with these portraits are still familiar today.