# Portrait of a Lady

- By: Unidentified (French)
- Date: ca. 1775
- Medium: watercolor on ivory
- Classification: Paintings
- Dimensions: 2 3/8 in. (6.0 cm) diam.
- Credit line: Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Catherine Walden Myer Fund
- Museum: [Smithsonian Institution](https://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=25090)
- Rights: [CC0 (Smithsonian Open Access)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://invisiblenetwork.ai/thumbs/web/e0755cc41f0cb60ca80b52e98f6e20e0.jpg
- Who can see it: Tweens profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

In this miniature the woman’s sparkling blue eyes draw us into the image. Her hairstyle reflects the French vogue for elaborately teased and “built-up” hair. In a letter from 1783, Thomas Jefferson noted that the simpler colonial styles made a woman’s head “as flat as a flounder.” The sitter imitated European fashions to convey her wealth and status, at a time when many colonial Americans were adopting a plainer style to express their desire for independence.