François Boucher (1703-1770) (after)
Claude-Augustin-Pierre Duflos (1700-1786) (engraver)
The Cherub Grape-pickers [?]
Mme Veuve Chereau, Paris: c. Mid 18th Century
Hand colored engraving
20.75 x 11 inches, overall
20.25 x 10 inches, plate mark
$1,200
Cherub Grape-Pickers
after François Boucher
after François Boucher
 |
 |
 |
Playful scene of cherubs bearing baskets of grapes, frolicking around a set of steps in a sunny Mediterranean landscape, a light-hearted allegory of autumn. A group attempts to lead a stubborn goat with two riders as three others hover above with a basket of grapes. A cherub duo with a basket of grapes sits on the whimsically curved platform beside the stairs. An armless classical statue of Bacchus towers over the scene. The borders are decorated with a rococo style design.
This is quite possibly a print after The Cherub Grape-pickers, one of a set of four large paintings with putti that Boucher painted for a patron in the 1730s. That painting is in a private collection in Switzerland and reproductions are not readily available, but information about it provided on the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s web site is congruent with the style and subject matter of this print.
In 1730-1735, Boucher completed a commission for a Parisian lawyer of four works with seasonal themes enacted by cherubs: The Cherub Fowlers, The Cherub Swimmers, The Cherub Grape-pickers and The Cherub Harvesters. Today the latter work is in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. In these works, according to the museum’s web site, “The allegorical meaning...is very muted, and the putti seem more like children playing than serious personifications of abstract concepts,” an approach which suited the tastes of collectors of the period. These four works were part of Boucher’s larger ambition to give rise to a new pictorial genre of large-scale paintings with putti, and he produced many such paintings.
François Boucher was a prolific French painter, draftsman and etcher, considered among the leading artists of the 18th century. He seems to have been one of the first artists to exploit the market for engravings after paintings, which spread his artistic influence throughout Europe at a time when Paris was the style setter in the fine and decorative arts. Boucher painted history and mythological subjects, and reinvented the genre of the pastoral with sentimental pictures of amorous shepherds and shepherdesses that were produced in every medium, including porcelain. Boucher's airy painterly style dominated French painting until the emergence of neoclassicism, which in part was a reaction against it. His paintings are in the world's major museums from The Hermitage, to the Louvre, to the Frick and Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
Claude-Augustin-Pierre Duflos was a French engraver who made prints after artists such as Boucher, Pater, Schenau, Benard, Le Barbier.
Madame le Veuve Chereau (literally, The Widow Chereau) was a French print publisher in Paris. She went into business when she inherited the plates of her husband, the engraver François Chereau (1680-1729), who had been the leading engraver of portraits during the reign of Louis XIV and also made engravings after the most celebrated painters of the epoch.
At the bottom is an inscription advertising the publisher and printsellers: Se vend a Paris Chez la veuve Chereau rue St. Jacque aux 2 piliers dor et Chez Huquier vis a vis le grand Chatelet avec priv. du Roy [Sold in Paris at the Shop of Widow Chereau, Rue St. Jacque at the two gold pillars and at Shop of Huquier across from the large Chatelet with the permission (privilège) of the King.]
Condition: Generally very good with the usual light overall toning, wear, soft creases. Small tear to top margin professionally repaired. Margins a bit short, as expected for separately issued 18th Century prints, but adequate.
References:
Bénézit, E. Dictionnaire critique et documentaire des Peintres, Sculpteurs, Dessinateurs et Graveurs. France: Librairie Gründ, 1966. (Duflos, Vol. 3, p. 378; F. Chereau, Vol. 2, p. 473) Chereau, )
“François Boucher.” The Grove Dictionary of Art. New York: Macmillan. 2000. Artnet.com. http://www.artnet.com/library/01/0104/T010423.asp (15 April 2004).
“Chereau.” Images of France database. http://duras.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/mckee.sh?artist=&title=&pub=chereau&period=&id= (9 August 2004).
“Rienzi Collection: The Cherub Harvesters.” Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. http://www.mfah.org/collection (9 August 2004).