Jean-Honoré Fragonard

This handsome example of Fragonard's early ability to draw from the model highlights the skills that all aspiring artists had to master, in accordance with the rigid and codified program of instruction at the French academy. As Marie-Anne Dupuy-Vachey described, some of the first drawings that can be attributed to Fragonard show the mark of his years of apprenticeship, spent from 1752 to 1756 at the Ecole des Elèves Protégés under the authority of Carle Van Loo, and then, from 1756 to 1761, at the Académie de France in Rome, directed by Charles Joseph Natoire.'¹This very accomplished study must date from the artist's Roman period; Dupuy-Vachey has suggested a dating to circa 1761 (see Literature). The figure is flooded with light and Fragonard brilliantly defines the space around the seated gladiator with a very controlled use of parallel lines in red chalk, to emphasize the volumes and contours of his body.  

We are grateful to Marie-Anne Dupuy-Vachey for confirming the attribution, having seen the drawing in the original.

^1. M.-A. Dupuy-Vachey, in Fragonard. Drawing Triumphant, exhib. cat. New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016-2017, p. 78