The Cupid Seller

The Cupid Seller (French: La Marchande d’Amours) or The Accessories Seller (La Marchande à la toilette) is a 1763 oil on canvas painting by the French artist Joseph-Marie Vien. One of the earliest works of French neo-classicism, it is based on an ancient fresco of the same name from Stabiae and shows a woman selling tiny cupids.

The work was acquired around 1778 by Louis Hercule Timoléon de Cossé, 8th Duke of Brissac, governor of Paris, who gave it to his mistress Marie-Jeanne Bécu, Comtesse du Barry in 1788 (she had previously been Louis XV's mistress). She was an important patron of Vien and kept the work at her chateau in Louveciennes, which was plundered in 1791 during the French Revolution, with the painting confiscated by the state. De Cossé-Brissac and du Barry both fell victim to the Revolution soon afterwards.

In 1837, during the July Monarchy, the work was taken to Palace of Fontainebleau, where it hang in the chambers of Helene, Duchess of Orleans, daughter in law of Louis-Philippe of France. It remains at Fontainebleau, in the 'Galerie des Fastes', on loan from the Louvre.

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