Nicolas Lancret
, French, 1690-1743
Title
La Malice (Mischief)Datec.1735
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions
36 x 29 cm
Credit LineBequeathed, Sir Hugh Lane, 1918
Object numberNGI.802
DescriptionNicholas Lancret was a painter of conversation pieces and elegant genre scenes known as fêtes galantes. His style and subject matter were influenced by the work of Antoine Watteau. Like Watteau, Lancret’s paintings are characterised by their gentle humour, grace and decorativeness. His paintings were reproduced widely as engravings. The setting of this light-hearted sketch is a dimly lit room where a young girl has fallen asleep while reading. The boy kneeling beside her tries to rouse her by blowing smoke from a lighted roll of paper. His mischievous expression contrasts with her relaxed features. Lancret has reserved brighter tones for the girl’s costume and the pink of her flushed cheek is echoed in the rose pinned in her hair. The figures of the children are a variation on the theme of lovers, a recurrent motif in the work of lancret and other French Rococo painters.
March 2016
ProvenanceCollection Sir A. Cooke; Sir Hugh Lane; bequeathed, Sir Hugh Lane, 1918 Exhibition HistoryPictures by Old Masters Given and Bequeathed to the National Gallery of Ireland by the Late Sir Hugh Lane, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, 1918
Exhibition of French Art 1200-1900, Royal Academy of Arts, London; City Art Gallery, Manchester, 1932
European Masters of the Eighteenth Century, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1954-1955
Centenary Exhibition, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, October - December 1964
France and the Eighteenth Century, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1968
From Titian to Delacroix: Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Ireland, Yokohama Sogo Museum of Art, Yokohama, 25 August - 17 October 1993; Chiba Sogo Museum of Art, Chiba, 10 November - 20 December 1993; Prefectural Museum of Art, Yamaguchi, 5 January - 20 February 1994; Kobe City Museum, Kobe, 25 February - 10 April 1994; Isetan Museum of Art, Tokyo, 14 April - 24 May 1994
European Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Ireland, National Gallery, Canberra, 25 June 1994 - 3 October 1994; Art Gallery of New South Wales, Adelaide, 21 October 1994 - 15 January 1995
Von Poussin bis Monet. Die Farben Frankreichs, The Arp Museum Bahnhof Rolandseck, Remagen, 22 March - 6 September 2015; Bucerius Kunst Forum, Hamburg, 10 October 2015 - 17 January 2016
Label Text
A young girl, who has fallen asleep while reading, is teased by her brother who blows smoke at her from a roll of lighted paper. Such modest subject matter, painted with deft assurance, was popular in eighteenth-century France. Lancret made his name as a follower of another Rococo artist, Jean-Antoine Watteau (1684-1721). He began painting fêtes galantes, depicting figures in fancy dress in outdoor scenes. Later he painted more intimate scenes, often of lovers. He infused this painting with tenderness, visible in the young girl’s peaceful expression.