Art Institute of ChicagoPublic domain

The Dreamer (La Rêveuse)

Jean Antoine Watteau · 1712–14

Provenance

Ownership history

Possibly the abbé Pierre Maurice Haranger (died 1735), canon of Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois, Paris; [based on Pierre Jean Mariette, Notes, Mss. IX, fol. 191[9] Bibliotehèque Nationale, Paris; see Wise 1996]. Comte du Barry, Paris; sold Remy and Le Brun, Paris, November 21 and following, 1774, no. 132, for 190 livres [supported by Gabriel de Saint-Aubin’s sketch in his copy of the sale catalogue in the Musée du Petit Palais, Paris]. Anne Pierre, marquis de Montesquiou, Paris; sold Le Brun, Paris, December 9 and following, 1788, no. 214 [une dame ajustée dans le costume Turc: elle est coëffée d’un bonnet ou turban, la tête tournée de trois quarts sur l’épaule droite, assise sur un tertie dans un fond de paysage. Hauteur 8 pounces 4 lig. largeur 6 pounces. B.” (A woman dressed in a Turkish costume; she is wearing a bonnet or turban, the head turned three quarters toward the right shoulder, seated on a mound in a landscape background. Height 8 pouces 4 lig., width 6 pouces. Panel]. Jules Burat (died 1885), Paris, by 1866; sold Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, April 28 - 29, 1885, no. 109 (ill. with engraving by Léon Gaucherel), as Lancret, to Laurent-Richard for Fr 7,000 [Eudel 1886 states that Burat acquired the picture in 1865; price and buyer at the Burat sale are given in a annotated catalogue of the Frick Art Reference Library]. Vincent Claude Laurent-Richard (died 1886), Paris; sold Galerie Georges Petit, May 28-29, 1886, no. 29 (ill. with engraving by Gaucherel), as Lancret, to Blumenthal for Fr 6,200 [see Rosenberg in Paris/Washington/Berlin 1984, no. P26; the price is given in an annotated catalogue at the Frick Art Reference Library]; Willy Blumenthal, (died 1937) Paris, to at least 1929 [Dacier, Hérold, and Vuaflart 1929, p. 178]. Acquired by Wildenstein, Paris, though an intermediary, 1935; transferred to Wildenstein, New York, 1938 [information kindly supplied by Ah-Whang Hsia, Wildenstein, letter of July 18, 2006 in curatorial file]; sold to the Art Institute, 1960.

Recorded by Art Institute of Chicago.

Exhibitions

Exhibition history

Paris, Société de protection des alsaciens et lorrains demeurés français, Ouvrages de peinture exposés au profit de la colonisation de l’Algérie par les Alsaciens-Lorrains au Palais de la Présidence ou Corps législatif..., 1874, no. 526.
Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, L’Art du XVIIIe siècle, 1883-84, no. 145.
New York, Wildenstein, Fashion in Headdress 1450 - 1943, April 27 - May 27, 1943, no. 36.
Paris, Gazette des Beaux-Arts, De Watteau a Prud’hon, May 11 - 31, 1956, no. 95.
Baltimore, Baltimore Museum of Art, Age of Elegance: The Rococo and its Effect, April 25 to June 14, 1959, no. 35.
Toledo, The Toledo Museum of Art, The Age of Louis XV, French Painting 1710-1774, 1975, no. 120, pl. 17; traveled to Chicago and Ottawa.
Chicago, Art Institute, Selected Works of 18th Century French Art in the Collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, 1976, no. 2.
Washington, D.C., National Gallery of Art, Watteau 1684-1721, 1984, no. P26; traveled to Paris and Berlin.

Literature

Published references

P[ierre] Hédouin, “Watteau III: Catalogue de son oeuvre,” L’Artiste: Revue de Paris 4th ser., 5 (1845), p. 78, no. 45.
Edmond de Goncourt, Catalogue raisonné de l’oeuvre peint, dessiné et grave d’Antoine Watteau, Paris, 1875, p. 82, no. 88.
John W. Mollet, Watteau, New York and London, 1883, p. 66, no. 88.
Paul Leroi, “M. Jules Burat,” L’Art: Revue illustrée 38, (1885), p. 169 (ill. with engraving by Léon Gaucherel following p. 171).
Paul Eudel, L’Hôtel Drouot et la curiosité en 1884–1885, Paris, 1886, pp. 355, 367.
Paul Eudel, L’Hôtel Drouot et la curiosité en 1885–1886, Paris, 1887, p. 436.
Louis de Fourcaud, “Antoine Watteau: Scènes et figures galantes (premier article),” La Revue de L’Art Ancien et Moderne 16 (1904) pp. 345, 350, (ill. with engraving by Aveline), 353, 354.
Emile Dacier, Catalogues de ventes et livrets de salons illustrés par Gabriel de Saint-Aubin, vol. 2. Paris, 1910, pt. 3, p. 29 (p. 47 of sale cat. facsimile).
Emile Dacier, Jacques Hérold and Albert Vuaflart, Jean de Jullienne et les graveurs de Watteau au XVIIIe siècle, 4 Vols., Paris, 1921–1929; vol. 1, Hérold and Vuaflart, 1929, pp. 117, 178, 264, under no. 166; vol. 3, Dacier and Vuaflart, 1922, p. 82, under no. 166.
Georges Wildenstein, Lancret. Paris, 1924, p. 117, no.704, fig. 202 (engraving by Léon Gaucherel).
Louis Réau, “Watteau,” in Louis Dimier, Les Peintres Français du XVIIIe siècle: Historie des vies et catalogue des oeuvres, vol 1, Paris and Brussels, 1928, pp. 38–39, no. 100.
Hélène Adhémar, Watteau: Sa Vie - son oeuvre. Paris, 1950, p. 219, no. 145, pl. 77.

Comparables