Wallpaper Description:

Only engraving presented by Ardail the lounge of the Society of French Artists in 1890 (No. 4847). Ardail resumed this board commissioned by the Gazette in 1887, but interrupted by his departure for military service, for an illustrated article about the retrospective exhibition of French art under Louis XIV and Louis XV.

Ardail executed this work after the work of Boucher reappeared in the collection of Sir Wallace and not after the engraving by Jean Daullé (1703-1763) dated 1776, only iconographic evidence of its existence before.

Boucher realized this table, with its counterpart La Muse Clio, for Madame de Pompadour. The Muse Erato, one of the companions of God's Day, personifies the erotic poetry.

François Boucher (1704-1770)

Painter of mythological and pastoral scenes of great virtuosity, whose last show is sensual, François Boucher was born September 29, 1703 in Paris. Student Francois Lemoyne (1688-1737), he won the Prix de Rome in 1720. Courtier, man of scenes and pleasures, Boucher, admired by Madame de Pompadour, was admitted to the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture, January 30, 1734 with "Rinaldo and Armida" as a piece. Upon the death of the painter and engraver Jean-Baptiste Oudry (1686-1755), he was appointed inspector at the Gobelins. He succeeds Carle Van Loo (1705-1765) as First Painter to Louis XV in 1765. Boucher died May 30, 1770 in Paris. His contemporary and friend, the writer Liège, Gilles Demarteau (1722-1776) has often engraved works of Boucher.