The Letter, or The Spanish Conversation

1. Sold, May 31, 1790, Anonymous sale, lot 323. Jean-Baptiste Pierre Lebrun (1748-1813), Paris; sold, April 11, 1791, lot 347. Saint; sold, May 4, 1846, lot 18 [according to New York 1988]. Duc Robert Montesquiou-Fezensac [Paris 1921]. David David-Weill (1871-1952), Paris, by 1913 [New York 1988]; consigned to Wildenstein and Company, New York, 1938 [New York 1938; Lynn H. Nicholas, The Rape of Europa (New York, 1994), p. 93]. Sold by Arnold Seligmann, Rey and Company, New York, to the Art Institute, 1945.

Recorded by Art Institute of Chicago.

• Paris, Pavillon de Marsan, "Fragonard," 1921, cat. 126.
• London, Royal Academy of Arts, "French Art, 1200-1900," 1932, p. 395, cat. 808.
• New York, Wildenstein and Company, "French Eighteenth Century Pastels, Watercolors, and Drawings from the David-Weill Collection," 1938, cat. 70.
• The Art Institute of Chicago, "Drawings Old and New," 1946, p. 13-14, cat. 18 (ill. frontispiece), cat. by Carl O. Schniewind.
• Cambridge, Mass., Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, "Seventy Master Drawings," 1948-1949, cat. 52.
• The Art Institute of Chicago, "French Drawings: Masterpieces from Seven Centuries," 1955-1956, cat. 81.
• New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, "French Drawings in American Collections: Clouet to Matisse," 1958-1959, cat. 49; traveled to Paris, Musée de l’Orangerie and Rotterdam, Museum Boymans.
• New York, Wildenstein and Company, "Master Drawings from The Art Institute of Chicago," October 17-November 30, 1963, n.p., cat. 60, pl. XX.
• The Art Institute of Chicago, "A Quarter Century of Collecting: Drawings Given to The Art Institute of Chicago, 1944-1970 by Margaret Day Blake," April 28-June 7, 1970, n.p., cat. 22 (ill.).
• The Art Institute of Chicago, "Selected Works of 18th Century French Art in the Collections of The Art Institute of Chicago," January 24-March 28, 1976, pp. 66-67, cat. 60 (ill.).
• Paris, Musée du Louvre, "Dessins français de l’Art Institute de Chicago de Watteau à Picasso," October 15, 1976-January 17, 1977, n.p., cat. 18 (ill.).
• Frankfurt am Main, Germany, Städtische Galerie im Städelschen Kunstinstitut, "Französische Zeichnungen aus dem Art Institute of Chicago," February 10-April 10, 1977, pp. 44-45, cat. 17 (ill.).

• Roger Portalis, Fragonard (Paris, 1889), p. 300.
• Société de Reproduction des Dessins de Maîtres (Paris, 1913), no. 5.
• Georges Wildenstein, "L’Exposition Fragonard au Pavilon de Marsan," La Renaissance de l’Art Français (July 1921), p. 359 (ill.).
• G. Henriot, Collection David-Weill III (Paris, 1928), p. 117 (ill.).
• Commemorative Catalogue of the Exhibition of French art, 1200-1900: Royal Academy of Arts, London, January-March 1932 (London: Oxford University Press, H. Milford, 1933), cat. 687, pp. 148-9, pl. 174 (ill.).
• “Recent Important Acquisitions of American Collections”, The Art Quarterly, IX (1946), pp. 77-78 (ill.).
• Carl Schniewind, "Chicago Reveals its Master Portfolio," Art News 45 (March 1946), p. 18 (ill.).
• The Art Institute of Chicago Bulletin 40:3 (March 1946), pp. 26-28 (ill.).
• "Additions to the Drawing Collection at The Art Institute of Chicago," The Connoisseur 118 (December 1946), p. 124 (ill.).
• Hans Tietze, European Master Drawings in the United States (New York, 1947), pp. 204-205, no. 102 (ill.).
• Agnes Mongan, One Hundred Master Drawings (Cambridge, 1949), p. 116 (ill.).
• Regina Shoolman and Charles Slatkin, Six Centuries of French Master Drawings in America (New York, 1950), p. 90 (ill.).

Portrait of a Man in Costume

Art Institute of Chicago

Arbor with Two Children (Le Nid d'Armour)

Art Institute of Chicago

The Stalled Cart

Art Institute of Chicago

Benjamin Franklin

Art Institute of Chicago

The Armoire

Art Institute of Chicago

Margaruerite Gerard Reading to Her Mother and Rosalie Fragonard

Art Institute of Chicago

Satyr Pressing Grapes Beside a Tiger

Art Institute of Chicago

The Departure by Coach

Art Institute of Chicago

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