Twitter, help me, I have been tearing Google apart for the last two hours trying to authenticate this drawing, which seems to exist only on social media

a Facebook friend shared it with the caption "Boarding School Friends (1837) by Unknown Artist, attributed to French School." I was skeptical, so obviously I did a reverse image search

the internet is FLOODED with reproductions of this image, all titled "Boarding School Friends (1837)" and all attributed, oddly, to "French School." like the French school of portraiture in general? or an actual school in France? I can find no further detail

I am highly, highly skeptical that "Boarding School Friends" is the original title, for several reasons:
--the phrase "boarding school" seems anachronistic for 1837
--the very concept of a girls' boarding school is definitely anachronistic for 1837
--I mean, look at it, duh

another possibility, of course, is that it's not actually from 1837. I'm not so solid on art/fashion history, so I can't date the clothing or portrait style with confidence, but early 1800s doesn't seem so far off. Still, it could be a modern drawing, or even a forgery

but on an even deeper level, my bullshit detector always starts ringing like crazy when I see any historical artifact on social media presented mockingly with the implication that people in the olden days were ridiculously ignorant about queerness. it's almost always fake

either it's a straight-up forgery, or it's presented in a false context to make historical people look stupid. In this case, for example, the drawing might be pornography/erotica -- which has always existed, and which you'd think would be fascinating on its own

but for some reason, people want to believe that people in the olden days were sexually ignorant prudes, especially when it came to women and queerness -- and this is extra-extra true when it comes to the Victorians and the 19th century in general

see also: the weirdly prevalent myth that Victorian doctors treated women with vibrators, totally oblivious to their patients' orgasms. It's not true, people.

but people desperately want to believe in this idea, I guess because it makes them feel smug and enlightened by contrast. And this is really made evident in the fact that NO ONE, as far as I can tell, has ever tried to authenticate this drawing when it's shared

whenever it's shared on social media, no one's ever like "Wait, this is obviously a drawing of two women kissing, that's amazing, what's the story behind it?" The comments are only ever along the lines of "Just gals being pals, lol!!! People were stupid in the olden days"

anyway, I can't find any evidence of this drawing's existence before June 8th, 2014, when it was uploaded to two different websites: this one https://fineartamerica.com/featured/boarding-school-friends-1837-french-school.html

and this one https://pixels.com/featured/boarding-school-friends-1837-french-school.html

so this is all to say: if you know anything about this drawing, please tell me, because this is killing me

and in general, if you see something like this on social media, I implore you to be more skeptical

BIG UPDATE: @poodlestar solved the mystery!!! it's a flipped, colorized version of a lithograph by Paul Gavarni (1804-1866), titled "Amitié de pension" (which is surprisingly close to "Boarding School Friends"!), in the Yale collection https://twitter.com/poodlestar/status/1300252368899125250

she's a beaut, all right:

this might go without saying, but the drawing is a work of erotica (the title is tongue-in-cheek, obvs). It was part of a series called "Scènes de la vie intime," which includes some VERY smutty stuff. this one's pretty fucking hot

so, what can we learn from tonight's journey?
--sex/porn/queerness existed in 1837
--even back then, cultural awareness of lesbians was filtered through the gaze of pornography
--you can find the answer to anything on the internet!