The Elder Sister

The Elder Sister (French: La soeur aînée) is a painting by nineteenth century French artist William-Adolphe Bouguereau in 1869. The painting was acquired by the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston in 1992 as an anonymous gift. According to the museum web site, this was a gift of an anonymous lady in memory of her father. Since then, The Elder Sister has been a part of the permanent collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (in the "Arts of Europe" section). It has become one of the most notable highlights in museum's collection of paintings.

The painting shows a girl ("the elder sister") sitting on a rock and holding a sleeping baby ("the younger brother") on her lap, with a quiet rural landscape behind them. For this scene, Bouguereau's daughter Henriette and son Paul served as models. The beauty of the girl and her eyes, which are looking directly at the viewer, as well the balance of the composition, including positioning of the legs and arms of the children, demonstrate Bouguereau's academic painting style.

The dimensions of the painting are 51¼ × 38¼ in (130.2 × 97.2 cm) and the frame is 67½ × 55 × 5½ in (171.5 × 139.7 × 14 cm).

There is also another painting by Bouguereau called The Elder Sister (completed in 1864), currently belonging to the permanent collection in the Brooklyn Museum.