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What is Antoine Watteau known for?
Watteau is credited with inventing the genre of fêtes galantes, scenes of bucolic and idyllic charm, suffused with a theatrical air. Some of his best known subjects were drawn from the world of Italian comedy and ballet.
What subject matter did Watteau introduce to painting?
It was in Gillot’s studio that Watteau was introduced to what would become a lifelong passion. The commedia dell’arte was a subject often painted by Gillot, even though its actors were expelled from France several years earlier. It was during this time that Watteau began painting this subject matter as well.
What was the Rococo style known for?
Rococo painting, which originated in early 18th century Paris, is characterized by soft colors and curvy lines, and depicts scenes of love, nature, amorous encounters, light-hearted entertainment, and youth. The word “rococo” derives from rocaille, which is French for rubble or rock.
What was the name later given to this subject matter that Watteau had a hand in inventing?
The Age of Feasts of Courtship Over the preceding years, fete galante (feast of courtship) had become a genre in its own right like history painting and still life. It was a genre which Watteau himself had invented and with which he had made his name.
What is Watteau’s contribution to art history and art today?
Watteau was largely responsible for helping to bring the architectural style of intricate whimsy and asymmetry known as the Rococo into painting. His personal style used light, soft colors and asymmetrical compositions to create paintings that were idyllic and warm, with a subtle hint of melancholy.
What defines Rococo style art?
Why was Watteau so successful as an artist?
Painting both decorative and fine arts works, Watteau’s subjects attracted a wealthy clientele and the newly emerging collecting class, making him quite successful during his lifetime. Watteau’s elevation of ornament combined with his subtle compositions, use of color, and playful subjects captures the Rococo era like no other artist.
How many drawings of Watteau are there?
And though he is reputed to have made anywhere between two and four thousand drawings, slightly fewer than seven hundred now survive. Watteau worked primarily in red chalk, or aux trois crayons, a technique employing red, black and white chalks to often stunning chromatic effect.
What does Watteau’s Pierrot look like?
The subject of his hallmark painting, Pierrot ( Gilles ), is an actor in a white satin costume who stands isolated from his four companions, staring ahead with an enigmatic expression on his face. Watteau’s final masterpiece, the Shop-sign of Gersaint, exits the pastoral forest locale for a mundane urban set of encounters.
What was Watteau’s nationality?
He was thoroughly French, for the province of Hainaut had always been French-speaking and culturally oriented to France. Watteau was not a Fleming, as his contemporaries liked to call him; he was a Walloon. Thieme, Ulrich, ed. (1920).