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- François Boucher (1703 - 1770)
- Daphnis and Chloe
- France
- 1743
- P385
- Landing
- Bookmarkable URLThe idea of the pastoral, depictions of an ideal rural and idyllic world inhabited by shepherds, goes back to antique literature and had been used increasingly since the Renaissance. Watteau created a Parisian version of the pastoral inhabited by fashionable young people in contemporary clothing. Boucher who was very familiar with Watteau's work from his early career as an engraver painted pastorals from the mid-1730s and developed them in a way that was seen as his own speciality. His pastorals feature gallant shepherds and shepherdesses that are simply but elegantly dressed and follow the decorum of fashionable courting. This painting is an exception in its use of half-naked figures and its openly erotic character. Because of this classicising mood, the painting has been linked to the Greek author Longus’s pastoral romance 'Daphnis and Chloe'.
The main group of the composition closely follows a bronze sculpture (lost, last documented in 1912) that could be by an Italian seventeenth-century artist: A version of it must have been available to Boucher. In this case, it would be a rare example of Boucher following a sculptural model for his paintings. A compositional drawing and studies for both protagonists exist. Boucher might have started with the composition of the bronze group and then studied studio models to prepare both figures for the painting. The compositional drawing is further away from the sculpture and might have been made after the painting.
The painting was cut down, and the painted surface originally had rounded outlines indicating the insertion into a decorative scheme. The viewpoint of the figures suggests the original use as an overdoor.
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- François Boucher (1703 - 1770)
- Shepherd Piping to a Shepherdess
- France
- c. 1747 - 1750
- P399
- Landing
- Bookmarkable URLThe painting is an example of the pastoral in Boucher's work from the late 1740s (see P385). In an Arcadian landscape a shepherd plays the flute to a shepherdess who is about to repay his efforts with a crown of flowers and the reward of her affections.
Boucher repeatedly took his inspiration from the immensely popular pantomimes of Charles-Simon Favart who created a contemporary Parisian version of Arcadian literature. At the opéra comique, where Boucher was both set designer and a keen member of the audience, Favart’s musical dramas combined Arcadian idealism and aristocratic sensibilities with the rustic characters of popular theatre. This painting might illustrate scene V of Favart’s 'Les Vendanges de Tempé' (The Harvest in the Vale of Tempé) of 1745, which opens with the shepherd playing the flute to his sweetheart Lisette - or it is inspired by Favart in more general terms. It was probably painted c.1747-50 in the aftermath of Favart’s stage success. The original, irregular shape of the canvas suggests that the picture originally formed part of a decorative scheme. Neither circumstance of the original commission nor companion pieces are known.
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- François Boucher (1703 - 1770)
- Madame de Pompadour
- France
- 1759
- P418
- Landing
- Bookmarkable URLPompadour has been famous for the important position as a patron and in politics that she obtained as Louis XV's mistress. Because of her great political intelligence, she successfully built and defended a highly influential position at the French court to a degree that was unusual for a mistress of the king. Madame de Maintenon had reached a similar position under Louis XIV and became a model for Pompadour's strategy. Pompadour became royal mistress in 1745 and remained an important political advisor equivalent to a minister after her sexual relationship with the king had ceased. A series of portraits by leading French painters - Jean-Marc Nattier, Boucher, Maurice Quentin de la Tour and Carle Vanloo - was commissioned and launched by her to publicise and strengthen her position in the public sphere. She also commissioned portrait sculptures by leading artists. Each work was intended to launch a specific message about Pompadour. The series has been most fully and most recently analysed by Andrea Weisbrod.
A series of portraits by Boucher, painted between 1750 and 1759, played a central role in this strategy. Boucher's most famous portrait of Pompadour, a life-size full-length painted in 1756, is today in Munich. The Wallace Collection painting is part of a series of smaller portraits.
In the years around 1750, Madame de Pompadour commissioned a series of works of art with friendship and fidelity as their central theme. These have often been interpreted as a reaction to the end of the sexual relationship between Louis XV and Pompadour. This might well be the case, but their most important message is the increased political importance of the Marquise who had become a major political advisor to the king, a position that was based on deep friendship between them. In the 1750s, she began to play the role of quasi-minister. The Wallace Collection’s portrait, the last known portrait Boucher painted of his patron, evokes these ideals by its inclusion of a sculpture depicting Friendship consoling Love that was based upon the work of eighteenth-century sculpor Jean-Baptiste Pigalle. The presence of Madame de Pompadour’s pet spaniel, Inès, shown seated on the bench beside her mistress, also makes reference to the emotions of comfort and security that come with lasting friendship. The parkland setting stresses the 'natural' and honest character of her relationship to the king. Whereas many of her portraits were presented at the Paris Salon, this painting does not seem to have reached a wider audience.
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- François Boucher (1703 - 1770)
- Pastoral Make-Up (La toillette pastorale)
- France
- 1745
- P445
- Landing
- Bookmarkable URLTwo shepherdesses and putti with flowers represent Spring. Originally the painting, together with P447, formed part of a set of four representing the Seasons, all of which were shaped in the same manner and engraved by Charles Duflos in 1751. From their shape and low viewpoints it is clear that they were painted as overdoors to be inserted into decorative panelling. The other two pictures in the series depict the winter as return of Diana from the hunt (Retour de chasse de Diane; Paris, Musée Cognacq-Jay) and summer (Les confidences pastorale; Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Museum of Art). Two of the seasons were thus depicted in the guise of mythological subjects, two as pastorals. An autograph, signed and dated version of this painting of 1748 was sold at Christie's, New York, 29 January 2014.
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- François Boucher (1703 - 1770)
- Erigone Conquered (Erigone vaincue)
- France
- 1745
- P447
- Landing
- Bookmarkable URLAs described by Ovid, Bacchus, disguised as a bunch of grapes, deceives the nymph Erigone. Originally the painting, together with P442, formed part of a set of four representing the Seasons, all of which were shaped in the same manner and engraved by Charles Duflos in 1751. From their shape and low viewpoints it is clear that they were painted as overdoors to be inserted into decorative panelling. The other two pictures in the series depict the winter as return of Diana from the hunt (Retour de chasse de Diane; Paris, Musée Cognacq-Jay) and summer (Les confidences pastorale; Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Museum of Art). Two of the seasons were thus depicted in the guise of mythological subjects, two as pastorals.
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- François Boucher (1703 - 1770)
- Pastoral with a Couple near a Fountain
- France
- 1749
- P482
- Landing
- Bookmarkable URLWith its pendant, P482, the painting represents some of Boucher’s most ambitious works in the pastoral mode. Boucher continued the pastoral, utopian mode of Watteau's Fêtes galantes, anchoring them more clearly in an idealised, Italian setting. By exchanging Watteau's contemporary Parisians with idealised shepherds and shepherdesses, he further removed the scenes from a recognizable contemporary reality, transposing them into an entirely imaginary world. While Watteau produced cabinet-sized pictures, Boucher often employed the pastoral for large-scale room decorations, as is the case here.
The two pictures originally belonged to the Daniel-Charles Trudaine, who worked as governor of the Auvergne, before being put in charge of roads and bridges in France, a capacity in which he was responsible for extending and modernising the network considerably. From 1745 he instigated and supervised the production of a new street atlas of France. Trudaine hung the two paintings in the grand salon on the ground floor of his château at Montigny–Lencoup near Fontainebleau.
The scene was inspired by the theatrical characters of the immensely popular pantomimes of Boucher's friend, Charles-Simon Favart. At the Opéra Comique, where Boucher was both set designer and a keen member of the audience, Favart’s musical dramas combined the Arcadian idealism and aristocratic sensibilities of pastoral poetry with the rustic, sentimental characters of popular theatre. Here we see a recreation of scene VI of Favart’s pantomime 'Les Vendanges de Tempé (The Harvest in the Vale of Tempé)', first produced in 1745, where the amorous Little Shepherd feeds grapes to the heroine, Lisette. The watching shepherd to the right is taken from a Rembrandt etching.
Boucher also provided a drawing of the main group to the Sèvres manufacture as a model for a porcelain group.