Lady in Evening Dress with Figure of Venus de Milo

William Page's sketch depicts a fashionable woman in mid-nineteenth-century evening wear, posed alongside a classical reference—the Venus de Milo statue visible in the background. The drawing demonstrates Page's interest in contrasting contemporary fashion with neoclassical ideals. Using pen and ink on aged paper, the artist captures the woman's composed expression and the draping of her gown with economic line work. Page, who trained in European academies and established himself in New York, here explores themes that occupied many American artists of his era: the relationship between modern society and historical artistic tradition.