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His Circle
X. A Game of Hide and Seek
Entered September 2021
Whereabouts unknown
Oil on canvas
97 x 72 cm
PROVENANCE
Avignon, Galerie Artmediacom. Ebay March 2016: "Entourage d'Antoine Watteau 1684/1721 - Fêtes galantes - Ecole Français. Huile sur toile - Restaurations aciennees pas visibles - retoilé - bon état. Format: avec cadre 103 x 81 cm - 40.5 x 31.9 inches - sans cadre 97 x 72 cm - 38.2 x 28.3 inches. Cadre en bois doré récent - bon état. 3 800,00 EUR."
REMARKS
Nicolas de Larmessin after Nicolas Lancret, Le Jeu de cache-cache-mitoulas, engraving.
When this painting was offered for sale in 2016 it was variously attributed to Watteau, Philippe Mercier, and Nicolas Lancret. In fact, the composition has nothing to do with Watteau or Mercier, but it is directly related to Lancret. It is based on Nicolas de Larmessin’s engraving after Lancret’s Le Jeu de cache-cache-mitoulas. The same engraving served for a painting in the Worcester Museum which is wrongly classified as “after Watteau.” While the copyist has copied the figures faithfully, he omitted the herm statue and reorganized the trees. The attribution to the eighteenth century seems doubtful.