Most likely the Tabu painting is a "commissioned" ad painting. While it's not a subject matter appropriate to my recent "researches" of great paintings. I don't remember seeing this painting in any of the 30,000+ paintings I've looked at in the last couple of years; -- but of course that doesn't mean it's not there.

The samples linked are too small for a good look at the painting, but I don't see the "style: of any of the artists mentioned thus far. It looks a little more like something one of the late 19th, early 20th century Russian artists might have done. An example would be Iliya Efimovich Repin, Russia, Realism, born 1844 - died 1930.

Apart from "style," Repin did portraits of a number of "musically associated" persons: Nikolay Rymsky-Korsakov, Alexander Glazunov, Mikhail Glinka, Anton Rubinstein, and Modest Musorgsky at this link. (Good images, if anyone's collecting composers.)

Another possibility might be one of the "Americans" from the turn of the century, in the style of Rush or Eakins, simply because the painting implies an illicit act without at least a "ripped bodice," as would be likely with any of the French or Italian artists (or Americans in Paris or Rome). Portraying "sexuality" was permissible only if the subject was "removed in time or space" even in the Art circles of 19th and early 20th century Europe, but as long as the subject "wasn't one of us" it was okay – in Europe – to show some nudity, or at least clothing in disarray. In the more represssive American market, the same "removal in context" was often risky if a work portrayed more than a suggestion (fully clothed) of persons doing something outside the bounds of "public moral values." The "Artist's Studio" and/or "The Rehearsal Room" worked for a number of artists to pass the censors, and/or the modesty of patrons, because immorality was "expected" for "those kinds of people" (Artists and Musicians?????).

Although it's debatable, my impression is that the Russian market showed repression similar to the American one.

John Singer Sargent, who was mentioned above, saw his career in Europe literally destroyed by one painting (Madame X) because it showed, suggestively(?) but actually rather modestly, a person known and quite prominent in the society in which the painting was presented. (That a major critic rather disliked Sargent probably had some effect as well.) To lesser extent, Goya's famous "Nude Maja" caused him some difficulty with obtaining commissions, at least for a time, because the subject was recognizable as "someone we know" by members of the contemporary society from whom he obtained his commissions.

For a major ad campaign, in the era when the Tabu ads first appeared with this image, it would have been normal practice to have an original painting created, so that the agency could have an "iron clad" copyright to prevent others from diluting the effect of their product's identification with the artwork. If a work by a "known artist" was to be used, it would have been common for the company to acquire the original, if possible, and have it safely locked away, before using it in any advertising. In either case, it's likely that only "the Tabu people" can positively identify the artist.

A direct inquiry, adressed to Tabu and/or to the ad agency currently representing them in your area might get a response. The worst they can do is throw your letter away (and send you advertising for the rest of your natural life). It is also possible that one of the major art dealers, or one of the many "poster shops," might be able to come up with at least an old ad poster reproduction. And there's always ebay…

It is an interesting painting, and I can promise to watch for it.

John