The Country Concert

Nicolas Lancret remains closely linked to the genre of the Fête galante. A pupil of Claude Gillot, admirer and friend of Watteau (before their falling out in 1718), Lancret soon replaced them both in the eyes of the public (Watteau died in 1721 and Gillot in 1722). Lancret's art is perfectly transcribed in the painting we are proposing: It is first of all a concert. Theatre and music make a strong comeback after the death of Louis XIV; it is the Opera, it is the Comédiens-Français and the Comédiens-Italiens, once again authorized by the Regent; it is the time when Marivaux triumphs with his plays. It is then a country concert. Lancret painted many of them. He places his scenes in the gardens and parks of Paris and its surroundings, with its statues, its water sources, its trees and its flowerbeds. Finally, as Georges Wildenstein writes in his biography of Lancret, if "Watteau is a painter 'of genius', Lancret [is] a precise and harmonious portraitist." In the foreground of our painting, a lute, tambourine and score are on the ground. One of the young women is playing the guitar, a second is reading a score and a third seems to be listening to an actor declaiming (unless we are witnessing a gallant conversation...). The fourth, seated in profile, is listening distractedly. Our painting, which underwent a complete restoration by the Atelier Clarisse Lavergne in 2021, is of very fine quality. A painting representing the same scene, of different dimensions and violined on the upper part, was sold by Maison Coutau - Bégarie on April 17, 2024 Details: - Oil on canvas. - Sold without frame. - Fully restored.