Les fêtes vénitiennes
after 1759
Medium
Watercolor and gouache over pen and brown ink
Dimensions
8 1/16 × 5 15/16 in. (20.5 × 15.1 cm) Framed: 21 1/4 × 16 1/4 in. (54 × 41.3 cm)
Classification
Drawings
Department
Robert Lehman Collection
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Robert Lehman Collection, 1975
Accession Number
1975.1.702
Tags
Art Historical Context
**Les fêtes vénitiennes** by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin, created after 1759, captures the exuberant spirit of Venetian festivals in a delicate watercolor and gouache over pen and brown ink. This intimate drawing, measuring just over 8 by 6 inches, depicts lively gatherings of men and women amid the masquerades and revelry for which Venice was famed. Saint-Aubin, a prominent French Rococo artist known for his vivid portrayals of 18th-century social life, brings a Parisian flair to this imagined Italian spectacle, blending precise ink outlines with luminous washes for a sense of movement and festivi...
About the Artist
Gabriel de Saint-Aubin · 1724–1780
Gabriel de Saint-Aubin (1724–1780) was one of the most vivid and irrepressible graphic artists of eighteenth-century France, a tireless draughtsman whose sketchbooks and prints constitute an extraordinary visual chronicle of Parisian life during the Ancien Régime. Born into a family with strong connections to the decorative arts — his father was an embroiderer to the king — Saint-Aubin received fo...