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Work 1,069 of 2,430
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Jean Antoine Watteau (French, 1684–1721)
Mezzetin
ca. 1718–20
Oil on canvas
21 3/4 x 17 in. (55.2 x 43.2 cm)
Munsey Fund, 1934
34.138
Mezzetin, a stock comic character of the Italian commedia dell'arte, became an established performer on the Paris stage. Various players were engraved in his costume, which by about 1680 comprised a jacket and knee-britches, often of red and white vertical stripes, a floppy hat, a ruff, and a short cape. Mezzetin was by turns interfering, devious, and lovelorn, but not languorous.

A chalk drawing from the model, belonging also to the Metropolitan Museum, is a study for his tilted head: it shows a rather crude unshaven face, with eyes rolled back and parted lips and teeth. Both the head and the large, angular hands in this painting are extraordinarily expressive, but they are not handsome, in fact quite the contrary. The figure is immensely felt, and it may be to Watteau's sensibility that the viewer chiefly responds.