Le Bal

This is a copy of Nicolas Lancret's painting, Le Bal, formerly in the collection of Frederick II of Prussia (see G. Wildenstein, Lancret, Paris, 1924, p. 93, no. 335, fig. 96) and last recorded in Berlin (see M. T. Holmes, Nicolas Lancret: Dance Before a Fountain, Los Angeles, 2006, pp. 55-6, fig. 52). Lancret evidently took his inspiration for the composition from Antoine Watteau's Les Plaisirs du Bal of circa 1715, which is now in the Dulwich Picture Gallery, London (inv. no. DPG156).