Love as Folly

c. 1773/1776

Jean Honoré Fragonard

Artist, French, 1732 - 1806

Media Options

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On View

West Building Ground Floor, Gallery G12

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on canvas

  • Credit Line

    In memory of Kate Seney Simpson

  • Dimensions

    overall (oval): 55.9 x 46.4 cm (22 x 18 1/4 in.)
    framed: 82.6 x 61.6 x 10.2 cm (32 1/2 x 24 1/4 x 4 in.)

  • Accession

    1947.2.1

More About this Artwork

Scholarly Article:  French Paintings of the Fifteenth through Eighteenth Centuries: Love as Folly, c. 1773/1776

A young woman draws on an oval surface with white chalk while three winged, baby-like putti gather nearby, all on a bank of pale pink clouds in this horizontal painting. The woman and putti have pale, rosy skin, flushed cheeks, and hazel-brown eyes. To our left, the woman reclines with her upper body propped up on her far elbow, which rests on a steel-blue cushion as her legs stretch out to our right. Her light brown hair is braided and wrapped across the top of her head. She wears a loose, seafoam-green robe over a billowing ivory-white garment that has slipped off the shoulder closer to us. A round paint palette with brushes sticking out of its thumb hole and a roll of blue and white paper sit in the lower left corner, behind the woman. The woman and the objects are on a red cloth. In front of the woman is a rounded surface, perhaps a canvas, on which she draws. She holds up a gold-colored stylus with her right hand, closer to us, with a pointed piece of white chalk in one end and black chalk in the other. The canvas is taller than her head, so the child-like putto she draws on it is life-sized. The three nude putti on the far side of the canvas have copper or golden-blond, curly hair, flushed, rounded cheeks, short wings in white or peacock blue, pudgy torsos, and dimpled limbs. One putto, presumably the one the woman draws, sits back on the bank of clouds with a carnation-pink sash across his chest. He pulls his chin back and looks at her from under his eyebrows. He holds a gold-colored torch with a pink flame in one hand, and the other hand rests near a cylindrical quiver of arrows. Another putto peeks around the side of the canvas, and the third stands and props the canvas up. That third putto holds up a wreath of laurel leaves up over the canvas, above the woman’s drawing hand. The bank of clouds is parchment-brown with muted pink and blue highlights against a vivid blue sky. The artist signed and dated the lower right, “F Boucher – 1765.”

Scholarly Series:  French Paintings of the Fifteenth through Eighteenth Centuries

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Possibly Jean François Leroy de Sennéville [1715-1784], Paris; possibly (his sale, Chariot and Paillet at Hôtel de Bulion, Paris, 5-11 April 1780, no. 56); possibly purchased by Verrier. possibly Marquis de Véri; possibly (his sale, Paillet, Paris, 12 December 1785, no. 39); possibly purchased by Millin. possibly Folliot; possibly (Folliot sale, Regnault, Paris, 15 April 1793, no. 50). Marquis des Isnards; (Wildenstein, London, New York, and Paris); probably held jointly with (Ernest Gimpel, New York); sold 1905/1906 to John Woodruff Simpson [1850-1920], New York; by inheritance to his widow, Katherine Seney Simpson [d. 1943], New York; by inheritance to her daughter, Jean W. Simpson [1897-1980];[1] gift 1947 to NGA.
[1] Georges Wildenstein wrote to Fern Shapley that his father had purchased this painting and its pendant, Love the Sentinel (NGA 1947.2.2), from the marquis des Isnards, whose unwritten family tradition was that they had owned the pair since they were painted (letter of 21 June 1948, in NGA curatorial files). The "CA" numbers on the stretchers of both paintings, and the corresponding prospectus for the pair (in NGA curatorial files) indicate that they were on consignment with M. Knoedler & Co. at some time during the Simpsons' ownership. See entry on page 17 of Commission Book 4, Knoedler Records, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles, copy in NGA curatorial files.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1914

  • Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings by Fragonard. Gimpel & Wildenstein Galleries, New York, 1914, no. 3.

2015

  • Fragonard amoreux: galant et libertin, Musée du Luxembourg, Paris, 2015-2016, no. 99, repro.

Bibliography

1880

  • Goncourt, Edmond de, and Jules de Goncourt. L'art du dix-huitième siècle. 2 vols. Paris, 1880-1884: 2:326.

1889

  • Portalis, Roger. Honoré Fragonard, sa vie et son oeuvre. 2 vols. Paris, 1889: 62, 102, 270.

1906

  • Nolhac, Pierre de. J.-H. Fragonard. Paris, 1906: 156.

1907

  • Dayot, Armand, and Léandre Vaillat. L'oeuvre de J.-B.-S. Chardin et de J.-H. Fragonard. Paris, 1907: 14, no. 108, repro.

1948

  • Wildenstein and Company. French XVIII Century Paintings. New York, 1948: 4.

1956

  • Einstein, Lewis. "Looking at French Eighteenth Century Pictures in Washington." Gazette des Beaux-Arts. 6th ser., 47, no. 1048-1049 (May-June 1956): 244, repro. 245.

  • Réau, Louis. Fragonard: sa vie et son oeuvre. Brussels, 1956: 146.

1960

  • Wildenstein, Georges. The Paintings of Fragonard. New York, 1960: no. 319, repro.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 51.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 44, repro.

1972

  • Mandel, Gabriele. L'Opera completa di Fragonard. Milan, 1972: no. 344, repro.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 132, repro.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 158, repro.

1987

  • Cuzin, Jean-Pierre. "Jean-Honoré Fragonard: Vie et oeuvre." Fribourg, 1987. English edition New York, 1988: 308, nos. 354-355.

1989

  • Rosenberg, Pierre. Tout l'oeuvre peint de Fragonard. Paris, 1989: 102, no. 286-287.

2009

  • Conisbee, Philip, et al. French Paintings of the Fifteenth through the Eighteenth Century. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 2009: no. 34, 172-176, color repro.

Inscriptions

On stretcher: two labels, "No. 9981 / PICTURE" and "No. 34358 / PICTURE"; in blue pencil, "CA 1877"

Wikidata ID

Q20178593

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