Design for a Scene in de Laujon's "L'Amoureux de quinze ans, ou la Double-Fête..."
18th century
Medium
Pen and brown ink with brown chalk
Dimensions
4 1/16 x 3 1/16 in. (10.3 x 7.7 cm.)
Classification
Drawings
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Fletcher Fund, 1944
Accession Number
44.54.26
Tags
Art Historical Context
This delicate drawing by Hubert François Gravelot, a leading French rococo artist of the 18th century, serves as a preparatory design for a scene in Charles de Laujon's comedic play *L'Amoureux de quinze ans, ou la Double-Fête* ("The 15-Year-Old Lover, or the Double Celebration"). Created with pen and brown ink accented by brown chalk, the small-scale work (just over 4 by 3 inches) captures an intimate moment likely involving lovers—men and women in playful, amorous entanglement—evoking the lighthearted romantic intrigues popular in French theater of the Enlightenment era. Gravelot, known for ...
About the Artist
Hubert François Gravelot
Hubert-François Bourguignon, known as Gravelot (1699–1773), was a leading French Rococo engraver, illustrator, and designer whose elegant draftsmanship bridged the artistic worlds of France and England. Born in Paris to a tailor, he adopted his pseudonym from a godfather and grew up alongside his elder brother, the geographer Jean-Baptiste Bourguignon d'Anville. After neglecting studies at the Col...