A 1885 oil portrait of a young girl by Swiss realist Albert Anker. The subject features blonde hair with a blue ribbon and a striped pinafore against a dark background.

Albert Anker painted this oil portrait in 1885. It depicts a young girl with blonde hair tied back by a blue ribbon. She wears a dark pinafore over a white blouse with blue vertical stripes. Her expression is calm and direct, looking slightly away from the viewer. The dark, neutral background ensures the focus remains entirely on the subject. Anker was a Swiss painter who specialised in scenes of rural life. He often depicted children in domestic or school settings. His work is characterised by a clear, objective style that avoids sentimentality. He studied in Paris under Charles Gleyre, where he learned the techniques of academic realism. This training is evident in the precise rendering of the girl's features and the textures of her clothing. The artist signed and dated the work on the left side of the canvas. The composition follows a traditional portrait format, using a limited colour palette of blues, whites, and earth tones. Anker's approach to portraiture was grounded in observation. He captured the everyday appearance of his subjects without idealisation. This painting is a representative example of his late nineteenth-century portrait work.