Three Figures Dressed for a Masquerade

The earliest sources attributed this painting to Pietro Longhi, and later it was attributed to several other painters of the Venetian school. Since 1978, the attribution to Le Lorrain, based on the painter’s distinctive treatment of faces, won general acceptance. The costumes of the two men flanking the seated woman are probably Polish. The architectural setting of the painting is borrowed from a print by Giovanni Battista Piranesi.