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| Boy with a Black Spaniel |
Artist:François Hubert Drouais (French, Paris 1727–1775 Paris)
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:Oval, 25 3/8 x 21 in. (64.5 x 53.3 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:The Jules Bache Collection, 1949
The picture is an autograph replica of a work (location unknown) that is fully signed and dated 1766 and was exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1767. A critic of the Salon described that first version as a portrait of a boy with an ebony-colored dog with jet black eyes. In general, portraits of children by Drouais were preferred to those representing adults.
Catalogue Entry
When writing about the 1767 Salon, the critic Denis Diderot (1713–1784), mentioned that one of Drouais's sitters was accompanied by "un chien d'ébèn avec des yeux de jais" (a dog of ebony color with eyes of jet). The artist's exhibits were a portrait of the comtesse de Brionne (location unknown), number 61, and, under number 62, several portraits ("Plusieurs Portraits"). What must be the primary version of Boy with a Black Spaniel is signed and dated 1766: it could have been exhibited at the Salon in the following year and mentioned by Diderot, but there is not enough information about the other portraits Drouais showed either to prove or disprove this possibility.
The boy in the 1766 picture is described as blond, with black eyes, and wearing a rose-colored coat with large buttons of the same fabric over a blue waistcoat with gold buttons. Here the same boy is dressed in brown. While the face and lace are painted with the usual care, Drouais is uninterested in the dog's anatomy.
Katharine Baetjer 2014
Copyright Image
https://images.metmuseum.org
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