Jean-baptiste Le Prince (1734-1781) The Tambourine And Galoubet Player

Jean-Baptiste Le Prince (1734-1781) Oil on oak panel. Signed on the back on a label: Le Prince 1767. Dimensions: 13.5 x 20 cm (excluding frame). Period Louis XVI frame in carved wood with flowers and a cartouche. This is a charming outdoor scene: a musician, playing the galoubet (recorder) and tambourine, makes his little monkey and dog dance before villagers seated at a table in a garden. The composition of this scene may be inspired by the works of Tenier the Younger, as Le Prince stayed in Holland during his training. The painting is presented in a magnificent 18th-century Louis XVI frame in carved and gilded wood. Jean-Baptiste Le Prince was an 18th-century French painter. Born in 1734 in Metz into a family of artists, his father was a master sculptor and his half-sister the author of the tale "Beauty and the Beast." He died in 1781. Jean-Baptiste Le Prince settled in Paris in his youth and became a pupil of François Boucher. He distinguished himself in the pure continuation of Boucher's work. A prolific artist, he learned engraving and aquatint. His works, regularly exhibited at the Salon, were favorably noted by Diderot himself. Three of his paintings are held at the Louvre, as well as numerous drawings and engravings. He traveled to Italy and then Holland, where he studied from Rembrandt's etchings, and then to Russia, where Jean-Baptiste Le Prince stayed for five years. Upon his return to France, he introduced Russian fashion and specialized in genre scenes. Museums: Paris: Cognacq-Jay; Agen: Musée des Beaux-Arts; Saint Petersburg: Hermitage Museum