Jean Samuel Poncet

The man and the young lady (inv.-no. 10067) in these two enamel miniatures can be identified thanks to the inscriptions on the reverse. They are Jean Samuel Poncet and his daughter Marie Henriette. He was born in Gurwolf/Courgevaux in the Swiss canton of Fribourg in 1750 and died in Tarare, a small town west of Lyon, in 1824. By his wife Henriette Louise Lambelet he had a daughter, Marie Henriette, who is shown in the other miniature. She was born in Aubonne, close to Lac Léman, in 1782 and married André César Brunel in the French town of Annecy in 1802. She died in 1832, also in Tarare.
The painter Brouner is not found in any encyclopaedia of artists. The name was probably originally Brunner, a common family name in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, which was adapted to create a French version. It is possible that Brouner was a relative of the miniature painter Henri-Salomon Brunner (1779 – 1837), who originated from a Swiss family in Thurgau that had moved to Lausanne. Here, Henri-Salomon Brunner called himself Henri Fontaine. Some good quality miniatures by him are known, painted in watercolour on ivory and dating from the 1820s. They are, however, stylistically so different from these two enamel miniatures that it is unconceivable they were painted by the same artist.¹
B. P.