Madame André Wormser and her Children

This quiet domestic scene shows all the warmth and intimacy of Vuillard’s late paintings. We are in the elegant drawing room of a Parisian home – that of the Wormser family, at 27 rue Scheffer. The decoration reflects the taste of fashionable French society in the 1920s: pictures by Manet, Monet, Renoir and Roussel hang on the wall, and above the piano, obscured by the reflection of a striped sun canopy, is a large pastel by Degas.Standing to the left is Madame Wormser, née Olga Boris, the wife of French banker André Wormser. Their four children – Diane, Sabine, Dominique and Olivier – are grouped in the brightly lit area on the right. Diane sits with the family’s pet dog at her feet and a musical score in her hands. Sabine, the youngest daughter, is next to her, absorbed in Dominique’s piano playing. Olivier stands at the back.Olivier served as an officer in the French Free Forces during the Second World War, and presented this painting to the National Gallery in thanks to the British nation.