François Boucher

Probably Richard Seymour-Conway, 4th Marquess of Hertford (1800–1870), London and Paris;

Sir Richard Wallace, 1st Baronet (1818–1890), London and Paris, by 1872;

Thence by descent to Julie Amélie Charlotte Castelnau, Lady Wallace (1819–1897), London and Paris;

Bequeathed to Sir John Edward Arthur Murray Scott (1847–1912), London;

His posthumous sale ('Sold by Order of the Court of Chancery'), London, Christie’s, 27 June 1913, lot 115, for £1207–10s. to Wertheimer;

With Ascher Wertheimer (1844–1918), London;

George A. Lockett Esq., London;

Thence by inheritance to his wife, Mrs George A. Lockett, London;

By whom posthumously sold, London, Christie’s, 19 June 1942, lot 53, for £1,680 to M. Repton;

With David Koetser, London and New York;

With Newhouse Galleries, New York, 1953;

Private collection, Switzerland, by 1963; 

Thence by descent.

A. Ananoff and D. Wildenstein, François Boucher, 2 vols, Lausanne and Paris 1976, vol. I, p. 374, no. 259, reproduced p. 375, fig. 779;

A. Ananoff and D. Wildenstein, L'opera completa di Boucher, Milan 1980, p. 106, no. 266, reproduced p. 107.

London, The Bethnal Green Branch of the South Kensington Museum, 1872, no. 454 (lent by Sir Richard Wallace);

Sarasota, Florida, John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, The Artful Rococo, 1953, no. 2 (lent by Newhouse Galleries, New York).

Datable to between 1743 and 1750, this bucolic view of figures beside a stream with a dovecote on the far bank is an early example of Boucher's supremacy in the depiction of the pastoral landscape – the genre for which the artist would become best known and most highly prized. The scene is suffused with summer sunshine, which catches on the rivulets in the stream in the foreground, and reflects off the still surface of the river itself. The two girls, one washing clothes in the river, a kind of carding brush beside her, the other having collected vegetation in a basket, stand out from the landscape in their brightly coloured dresses, their commonplace activities situated in a timeless idyll.

The composition relates to a painting dating to a similar period, in which the scene is expanded on both sides to comprise another figure looking over the water, a waterwheel, and additional buildings; the group in the foreground also includes a child.¹ Such adaptations into different formats are not uncommon within Boucher's œuvre, and may also be found in his drawings.² Indeed, the dovecote that provides the focus for both versions of the scene was clearly a favoured motif for Boucher around these years, as it reappears in several works, such as the painting recorded in a private collection, London, the composition of which informs the wider version of the present work,³ and a vertical format painting, Le Petit Pêcheur, signed and dated 1743.⁴ Its earliest incarnation would appear to be in one of the small pendants on copper dating to 1739, in the Kunsthalle, Hamburg.⁵ The figure of the standing girl with her back to the viewer, here, served as a model for two engravings, by Boucher and by John Ingram.⁶

We are grateful to Alastair Laing for tentatively endorsing the attribution to Boucher on the basis of first-hand inspection, and for his help in the cataloguing of this lot.

Note on Provenance

This painting was most probably acquired by Richard Seymour-Conway, 4th Marquess of Hertford (1800–1870), one of the greatest collectors of the 19th century, whose collection informs the essential character and makes up the vast majority of paintings and decorative arts at the Wallace Collection, London. Brought up in Paris, Lord Hertford's interest in and predilection for French Rococo art was developed from an early age, and he acquired such works on a grand scale. The present work would undoubtedly have appealed to his taste, and in all likelihood was once among a number of other paintings by Boucher that he owned, some fifteen of which are still in the Wallace Collection today. Richard Wallace (1818–1890), most probably Lord Hertford's illegitimate son, became the marquess' assistant in Paris, and in 1870 inherited his entire collection, along with property in France, England and Ireland. Two years later, in 1872, Wallace lent this painting to an exhibition at the Bethnal Green Branch of the South Kensington Museum.

John Edward Arthur Murray Scott (1847–1912) became secretary and advisor to Sir Richard and his wife, Lady Wallace, helping Lady Wallace with the establishment of the Wallace Collection at Hertford House following her husband's death; Scott was created a Baronet in 1899 for these services. When Lady Wallace died in 1897, almost everything that was not bequeathed to the nation as part of the Wallace Collection was left to Murray Scott, including the Paris apartment and chateau, as well as the Lisburn estate in Ulster. Scott continued as Chairman of Trustees of the Wallace Collection, and as a Trustee for the National Gallery, until his death in 1912. His family thereafter sold his works of art, many of which were from Richard Wallace's collection, at Christie's in 1913, when this canvas made one of the highest prices in the sale, along with A Shepherdess, by Boucher; a Portrait of Mme. Victoire, by Nattier; and two Fête Champêtres, by Watteau, one of which is today in the Art Institute of Chicago.⁷

¹ Oil on canvas, 59.7 x 73.7 cm. Sold along with a pendant at Sotheby's, London, 7 July 2004, lot 52, for £431,200. While some elements of the present painting are not rendered quite as successfully as others, this is to be expected in a second version of a composition that differs only in format from the original.

² See, for example, the drawing engraved by Eberts as Jeanette, an upright taken from the drawing today in the California Palace of the Legion of Honour; Ananoff and Wildenstein 1976, vol. II, p. 371, nos 255/2 and 255/3, reproduced figs 768 and 769, respectively.

³ Ananoff and Wildenstein 1976, vol. I, p. 369, no. 253, reproduced fig. 761.

⁴ Ananoff and Wildenstein 1976, vol. I, p. 372, no. 256, reproduced fig. 770.

⁵ Oil on copper, 26.9 x 35.4 cm., inv. no. HK-784; https://online-sammlung.hamburger-kunsthalle.de/en/objekt/HK-784/der-alte-taubenschlag.

⁶ Ananoff and Wildenstein 1976, vol. I, p. 374, nos 259/1 and 259/2, the latter reproduced fig. 778.

⁷ Oil on panel, 48.6 x 64.5 cm., inv. no. 1954.295; https://www.artic.edu/artworks/107938/fete-champetre-pastoral-gathering.