Jean-Honoré Fragonard

Baptiste Lasquin (d. 1902), Paris, as of 1877,
his sale, Paris, Drouot, 21 May 1884, lot 46, where acquired by
Dervaux collection, Condé;
sale, London, Sotheby's, 13 July 1972, lot 16

London, Grosvenor Gallery, Winter Exhibition of Drawings by the Old Masters..., 1877-78, no. 1071;
Paris, École des Beaux-Arts, Catalogue descriptif des dessins de maîtres anciens, 1879, no. 583;
Tokyo, Wildenstein, Maîtres du dessin français au 18ème siècle, 1977, no. 17;
Nishinomiya City, Otani Memorial Art Museum, Exposition Rococo: poésie et rêve de la peinture française au XVIIIe siècle, 1978, no. 21;
Tokyo, The National Museum of Western Art, and Kyoto, Municipal Museum, Fragonard, 1980, no. 115;
London, Wildenstein, “Cabinet des Dessins:” French Master Drawings XVIth-XIXth Century, 1993, no. 17 (checklist);
Tokyo, Wildenstein, Les Grands Maîtres du dessin français du XVIIIe siècle: Watteau, Boucher, Fragonard, 1995, no. 17;
New York, Wildenstein, French Master Drawings from the 16th through the 18th Centuries, 1999 (no catalogue)

P. de Chennevières, Les Dessins de maîtres anciens exposés à l'École des Beaux-Arts en 1879, Paris 1880, pp. 110-111;
R. Portalis, Honoré Fragonard, sa vie et son oeuvre, Paris 1889, p. 315 (drawing erroneously described as “en hauteur”);
A. Ananoff, L'Oeuvre dessiné de Jean-Honoré Fragonard, vol. I, Paris 1961, p. 159, no. 366; vol. II, 1963, (Addenda and corrigenda), p. 308; vol. III, 1968, p. 299

Laid down. Overall in good condition. A few tiny fox marks in the upper left section. Slight discoloration to sheet. Medium remains fresh. Black chalk under drawing still strong and lively. Sold in carved and gilded frame.
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The drawings that were generated by Fragonard’s second trip to Italy in 1773-74 are rather different in character from those that resulted from the artist’s reactions to what he saw during his first, much earlier journey of 1755-60.  Typically much more delicate and subtle, with the finest modulations of brown, or sometimes grey, wash tone creating evanescent, misty and intriguing vistas, these drawings are some of the most refined landscapes that Fragonard ever made.  Occasionally, as here, he also incorporated touches of watercolor, but these lightly colored drawings are very rare within his work; of the artist's other landscape drawings of this type, one of the best known is the View of a Park in the Lehmann Collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.¹

During this visit to Italy, Fragonard travelled with his patron, Pierre Jacques Onésyme Bergeret, and who seems to have inscribed "Rome 1774" on a number of the drawings that Fragonard made along the way.  In many cases these drawings depict specific, identifiable locations, but in others, such as this, the view appears to be imaginary.  Yet even if it is not a depiction of a real view, this lively, animated scene captures to perfection every aspect of the life of a country estate of this period, from the buildings and the planting of the terraces, through the work of the gardeners, to the amorous couple seated to the right.

¹ Inv. 1975.1.628; Ananoff, op. cit., no. 790