The Adoration of the Shepherds

The son and pupil of François de Troy, Jean-François was received in 1708 into the Académie Royale as a history painter, but also worked in other genres. As one of the leading painters of the Parisian élite, he satisfied the demand for erotically charged scenes from the Bible such as Susannah and the Elders (Rouen); with his tableaux de modes, he replaced the ambiguity of Watteau's fêtes galantes with a more authentic portrayal of contemporary manners and fashions. This particularly intimate depiction of the Adoration of the Shepherds was probably painted by de Troy in 1727, a year after his religious masterpiece, Sainte Geneviève and the Aldermen of Paris, in St. Etienne du Mont, Paris.