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Awakening (Le réveil)
  • Date: 1781
  • Object Type: Painting
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Image size: 95.5 x 142.7 cm
  • Inv: P483
  • Location: Study
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Description
Provenance
Marks/Inscriptions
Further Reading
  • The present picture was commissioned from Taraval in 1781, together with Jollain’s 'Sleep (Le sommeil)', P488, as an overdoor for the Marie-Antoinette’s bedchamber in the Royal pavilion of the château Marly. In 1781/1781 the room was re-decorated in a fashionable neo-classical style. The ceiling of the room was lowered to provide space for a mezzanine. As a consequence the earlier and larger overdoors by van der Meulen depicting the sieges of Gray and Fribourg needed to be replaced by smaller works in a new taste. The direction of the light indicates that Taraval's overdoor was painted for the East wall where the window would have been on the right. The names of the authors were already forgotten in 1787 when the paintings were attributed to Durameau. Acquired by the 4th Marquess of Hertford under an attribution to Boucher, and later catalogued as by Fragonard (q.v.), the provenance of both paintings was only rediscovered in 1987.