The Age of Watteau, Chardin, and Fragonard: Masterpieces of French Genre Painting

October 12, 2003-January 11, 2004

Overview: Scenes of daily life by Antoine Watteau, Jean Siméon Chardin, Jean-Honoré Fragonard, Jean-Baptiste Greuze, François Boucher, Louis-Léopold Boilly, and other 18th-century French artists were presented in this exhibition of 106 paintings and one drawing. This first large-scale survey of French genre painting included works spanning the century, from the time of Louis XIV to the French Revolution. A companion exhibition, Colorful Impressions: The Printmaking Revolution in Eighteenth-Century France, was on view in the ground floor central galleries from October 26, 2003-February 16, 2004.

An audio tour was narrated by National Gallery of Art Director Earl A. Powell III and included commentary by Philip Conisbee, senior curator of European painting at the National Gallery; Colin B. Bailey, chief curator of the Frick Collection, New York; and Susan Siegfried, professor of art history, University of Michigan.

The exhibition was organized by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, and the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie. Philip Conisbee was curator of the Washington exhibition, in collaboration with Colin B. Bailey, chief curator of the Frick Collection and former chief curator, National Gallery of Canada, and Thomas W. Gaehtgens, director, Deutsches Forum für Kunstgeschichte, Paris. The exhibition was made possible by The Florence Gould Foundation. It was supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities.

Attendance: 91,018 (92 days)

Location: West Building, Main Floor, Galleries 72 through 79

Catalogue: The Age of Watteau, Chardin, and Fragonard: Masterpieces of French Genre Painting, by Colin B. Bailey, Philip Conisbee, and Thomas W. Gaehtgens. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, in association with the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 2003.

Brochure: The Age of Watteau, Chardin, and Fragonard: Masterpieces of French Genre Painting, by Philip Conisbee. Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 2003.

Web site: The exhibition brochure was available online. Related Online Resources

Other venues:

National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa

June 6-September 7, 2003

Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie

February 8-May 9, 2004

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