Madame Jean-Baptiste Nicolet (Anne Antoinette Desmoulins, 1743–1817)

Jean-Baptiste Greuze French

Not on view

Anne Antoinette Desmoulins married the actor and theatrical manager Jean Baptiste Nicolet (1728–1796) in 1766. A member of his troupe from an early age, she took amorous parts and later character roles in both pantomimes and spoken plays. She retired in 1780 to manage his theater and is shown here as a respectable businesswoman with books by the playwright Molière and philosopher Rousseau on her desk. The hazy effect of Greuze’s brushwork animates the painting’s surface with a velvety texture that is characteristic of the artist in the late 1780s.

Madame Jean-Baptiste Nicolet (Anne Antoinette Desmoulins, 1743–1817), Jean-Baptiste Greuze (French, Tournus 1725–1805 Paris), Oil on wood

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