Jean-Francois Millet drawing

I have what I think is a Millet drawing. The reasons are:

Stylistically the lines, shading and use of white to highlight the drawing are similar to ‘Head of a boy’ 1846-48 and ‘Portrait of Marguerite Sensier’ 1866 (Harvard Art Museum). Particularly in the Sensier drawing Millets use of line to define the edges of the clothing is much the same as it is in my drawing.

The medium is also the same black crayon with touches of white paint on light brown paper and the physical size of the drawing is similar to other drawing by Millet of this period.

Millet’s signature varied – on many drawings he used a stamp but on the ones he signed he used a range of letter characters of which the signature of the drawing fall within.

Many of Millet’s drawing have been reused on the reverse, this drawing is no exception and contains two studies of hands. One of these studies almost exactly matches one of the hands in the painting ‘The Knitting Lesson’ 1869 (Saint Louis Art Museum).

I have sent the drawing to leading experts in the artist and await their reply but would be very interested in hearing any views on this.