Jacques-Philippe Caresme (1734-1796) (after)

J. Couché (engraver)

La Petite Thérese [Little Theresa]

J. Couché, Rue Ste. Hyacinthe, No. 51, Paris: Late 18th Century (restruck Late 19th Century)

Color printed engraving

19 x 14.25 inches, overall

14.5 x 10.5 inches, plate mark

A pretty young woman gathering grapes is pursued through the vineyard by a handsome young suitor, who according to the accompanying verse, waits there, his hat pulled over his head, disguising himself among the stakes. When she comes near, he snatches her by the petticoat and says, "So you come to enjoy the grapes in the vineyard of your neighbor?" Sexually suggestive genre scenes like this one were popular in middle and late 18th century French art.

The lower margin features a coat of arms and contains the following inscription:

"Dédiée à Madame de Blangermont,

Blaise á la parsin s'apprête

L'I même à faire le guet,

Du chapeau couvrant sa tète,

I s'plante au lieu du piquet.

La Belle ye viant, il la happe

Par son jupon de bazin:

Vous v'nez donc mordre à la grappe

Dans la vigne du voisin?"

Jacques-Philippe Caresme was a French painter, engraver and illustrator. The son and cousin of artists, he entered the Académie Royale in 1753 and won second place in the Prix de Rome competition there in 1761. Accepted into the Académie in 1766, he began to exhibit regularly at the Salon. He completed commissioned paintings for Bayonne Cathedral and the Petit Trianon, Versailles , where they remain to this day. In 1777, the Académie commissioned a painting for the ceiling of the Gallery of Apollo in the Louvre; when he failed to produce it he was expelled from the Académie the following year.

Condition: Generally very good with the usual light overall toning and edge wear. Very pale faint mat burn.

References: