Results: 1
-
View: Detail
-
- Works of Art
-
-
-
- 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.
-
-
- 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.