Chapter 10.12: Rococo Painting and Sculpture

Painting during the Rococo period has many of the same qualities as other Rococo art forms such as heavy use of ornament, curved lines and the use of a gold and pastel-based palette. Additionally, forms are often asymmetrical and the themes are playful, even witty, rather than political, as in the case of Baroque art. Themes relating to myths of love as well as portraits and idyllic landscapes typify Rococo painting.

Antoine Watteau

Antoine Watteau is considered to be the first great Rococo painter. His influence is visible in the work of later Rococo painters such as Francois Boucher and Honore Fragonard. Watteau is known for his soft application of paint, dreamy atmosphere, and depiction of classical themes that often revolve around youth and love, exemplified in the painting Pilgrimage to Cythera.

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Image and Video

Antoine Watteau, Pilgrimage to Cythera (5:19)

Elizabeth Vigee-Lebrun

The artist who created this opulent showpiece became famous and wealthy as Queen Marie-Antoinette’s official court painter. She was born to Louis Vigée and Jeanne Maissin in a bustling section of Paris. In her autobiography Souvenirs written towards the end of her life, Vigée-LeBrun wrote that her father, a minor portraitist, doted on her, wishing his daughter fame and good fortune; and that he cherished her early efforts at drawing. Vigée-LeBrun wrote that her mother thought her awkward and ugly. Nevertheless, she grew up to be intelligent, beautiful, rich, and talented, characteristics on display in her Self-Portrait of 1790.

Created soon after her swift departure from France at the onset of the French Revolution, Vigée-LeBrun’s Self-Portrait in the Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence, is one of her best-known pictures. It is a late example of the Rococo style. Rococo epitomized a fashionable ideal, wherein perpetual youth was libertine and pleasure-loving, its sexual gratification taken without guilt or consequence. Despite this, The artist, like her royal patron, was extremely conservative in her politics.

Francois Boucher

Francois Boucher became a master of Rococo painting somewhat later than Watteau. His work exemplifies many of the same characteristics, though with a slightly more mischievous and suggestive tone. Boucher had an illustrious career, and became court painter to King Louis XV in 1765. There was controversy later in his career as Boucher received some moral criticism from people such as Diderot for the themes present in his work. The Blonde Odalisque was particularly controversial, as it supposedly illustrated the extramarital affairs of the King.

Image and Videos

Fragonard, The Swing (3:21)

Sculpture

In sculpture, the work of Etienne-Maurice Falconet is widely considered to be the best representative of Rococo style. Generally, Rococo sculpture makes use of very delicate porcelain instead of marble or another heavy medium. Falconet was the director of a famous porcelain factory at Sevres. The prevalent themes in Rococo sculpture echoed those of the other mediums, with the display of classical themes, cherubs, love, playfulness, and nature being depicted most often as exemplified in the sculpture Pygmalion and Galatee.