Rococo
(Baptism) October 10 , 1684, Valenciennes, France
Watteau elevated to visual poetry the already lofty art of the Rococo period with his oil scenes of courtly love and elegant society festivities. His work is characterized by having many layers of (mostly transparent) colors in an array of pleasant tones. The happy feel of his paintings made for a poignant contrast to his personal life, which was miserably lonely and punctuated by frequent illness. Watteau's output was terminated by his early death.
- • Gilles and his Family (1716)
- • Embarkation for Cythera (1717-19)
- • Mezzetin (1717-19)
- • L'Enseigne de Gersaint (1720)
July 18, 1721, Nogent-sur-Marne, France
- Borsch-Supan, Helmut. Antoine Watteau 1684-1721 (Masters of French Art). Konemann, 2001.
- Plax, Julie Anne. Watteau and the Cultural Politics of Eighteenth-Century France. Cambridge University Press, 2000.
- Posner, Donald. Antoine Watteau. Cornell University Press, 1984.
- Vidal, Mary. Watteau's Painted Conversations: Art, Literature, and Talk in Seventeenth- And Eighteenth-Century France. Yale University Press, 1992.
- Zeri, Federico; Dolcetta, Marco. Watteau: The Embarkment for Cythera. NDE Publishing, 2000.
See more resources on Jean-Antoine Watteau by following the links at right
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(Image scan courtesy and copyright of Mark Harden, used with kind permission. Please visit The Artchive for more fine resources.)
