[1870s][RARE] Help identifying signature

Hello everyone!
I need some help identifying the signature of a painting I recently acquired from a family member. The painting was acquired originally to the family back in 1870 - 1890 in Brazil as payment for winning a lawsuit, and has been in the family ever since.
We are trying to identify the artist and possible putting it up in auction.
I will only upload the signature here, and open to suggestions and possible sharing a picture of the painting itself to someone interested in helping!
Thanks.

 

Welcome to the Forum C.Guardia!
Please hit edit, more options , Display all images Full size. It will be easier for everyone to see.

 

Welcome to Antiquers cguardia!

Difficult to see anything......just a blur.

 

Thank you, is it likely to be a Brazilian artist?

 

not 100% sure..

A little more history, the painting was giving to "Visconde Luís Antônio Vieira da Silva" (he even has a wiki page!).. he was a lawyer back in the 1870s and won a big case, and was given this painting as settlement.. originally it was in a gold frame.. it remained like this and handed to every generation until it got to my mother-in-a-law's father, who sold the gold frame and gave the painting and a letter from the same time 1870s as proof.. which then she's kept it in the house until now, that gave it to my wife...
We are trying to identify the artist.. (there were rumors that it might also be Renoir) but never proven.
The painting is a young lady with a white dress and white hat with a flower.. she's probably around 16-20 years old..

 

This is the original picture... below the signature there are also some letters... (maybe Charlotte...?)

 

Interesting background. I’m sure people here try to figure it out, from what you’ve provided. But authentication is something different. I understand you don’t want to Display front. The back of the frame may be helpful.

 

Welcome to Antiquers.

If you can make out the first letters after the "R" and the artist is listed, you might get lucky looking through askart.com.

From what we can see here, it doesn't look like the examples of Renoir's signature I saw by googling.

 

I used to have some programs on my laptop that would use various algorithms to reconstruct faint text, dunno if they are still on the h drive or not.

 

I agree with Pat P. Doesn't appear to match known signatures. He didn't sign with an "A".
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Pierre-Auguste_Renoir_Signatures

 

http://www.askart.com/artist/artist/R1.aspx

Here’s the website Pat referred to. Maybe you can type out what the seal on the back says. I can’t read it. Maybe we can determine a country.

 

I think this is the best I can do to make it more legible. Not sure it helped all that much, though.

 

Welcome, C.Guardia.
The name looks like Re-n--. The last two could be -ad.
Unfortunately not Renoir, not even a cousin with the same surname.

 

Welcome cguardia. I hope you enjoy the forum. I am not sure where you are in the world, but is there any reason you could not take it to your local or regional art gallery for them to give you an opinion? Our state art gallery does regular assessment days.

 

hi all!!
Thanks everyone for their reply.. I was very busy at work and couldn't work on the Painting for a long time...
I started analyzing the painting very closely again, and there's a very small seal located in the lower right corner of the back of the Painting.. I even posted a picture above.. but we were looking at it incorrectly, as it was upside down!..

Behold your eyes:


Tell it doesn't look like the Coat of Arms of the City of London! and you can even read LONDON at the bottom..

Has anyone here seen this Seal or Coat of Arms before..? it would help a lot to find the Artist.

 

It does. That would be a clue as to where the material was made, which is a start. But it could have been sold to an artist supply store in another country, and bought by the artist.


If only we could read the other words on your coat of arms.....

 

best for OP to have a closer look but can clearly see
TURNes ...
SUPE ...
sorry don't know enough about art to search

 

Did I miss something? Is there a photograph of the painting itself somewhere in the above thread?

Debora

 

Sorry.. i'll post a picture of the painting:

Also, I was able to decipher that under the signature, that starts with A. Ra... it says Charlotte..

and now that we know the Seal is from London.. could this be linked to Allan Ramsay and his paintings of Queen Charlotte..? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Ramsay_(artist)

Also the dates do match, as the painting was given to the family back in 1850s.. so it had to be done years before that, as it was already of value back then..