Lot Essay
The present drawing was probably executed as an independant work of art, although it is close to the head of the girl looking down, on the left of the picture Le Pêcheur in the Kunsthalle, Hamburg, A. Ananoff, François Boucher, Lausanne and Paris, 1976, no. 502, fig. 1399. The finished aspect of the drawing and its mount, by one of the foremost framers and experts of the period, Jean-Baptiste Glomy, suggest it was intended for a collector.
It was a common practice for Boucher to produce finished drawings independently from his pictures in order to sell them to collectors. Two pastels, one of a boy, in the Art Insitute, Chicago, and the other of a girl (sold at Christie's, New York, 11 January 1994, lot 266), were probably made as independent works, although they appear in two paintings in the Feray and Thyssen-Bornemisza collections in Sainte Addresse and Madrid, respectively.
Drawings of female heads by Boucher were much sought after by collectors. This is also reflected by the great number of prints by Demarteau and other engravers after Boucher's head studies.
The Hamburg picture was executed in 1759 as a pendant to Les Amoureux dans un Parc, painted the year before, and now in the Timken Art Gallery, San Diego.
The attribution of the present drawing to Boucher has been kindly confirmed by Alastair Laing.
It was a common practice for Boucher to produce finished drawings independently from his pictures in order to sell them to collectors. Two pastels, one of a boy, in the Art Insitute, Chicago, and the other of a girl (sold at Christie's, New York, 11 January 1994, lot 266), were probably made as independent works, although they appear in two paintings in the Feray and Thyssen-Bornemisza collections in Sainte Addresse and Madrid, respectively.
Drawings of female heads by Boucher were much sought after by collectors. This is also reflected by the great number of prints by Demarteau and other engravers after Boucher's head studies.
The Hamburg picture was executed in 1759 as a pendant to Les Amoureux dans un Parc, painted the year before, and now in the Timken Art Gallery, San Diego.
The attribution of the present drawing to Boucher has been kindly confirmed by Alastair Laing.