Jean-Antoine Watteau: the first documents

• Autores: François Marandet
• Localización: Burlington magazine, ISSN 0007-6287, Vol. 153, Nº 1298, 2011, págs. 312-313
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • The discovery of notarial acts concerning the estate of the painter Jean-Antoine Watteau allows us to clarify what happened to his drawings after he died. Watteau is very poorly documented in the archives, and what is known about his life is chiefly based on evidence from the art dealer Edme-Fraņcois Gersaint, patron and collector Jean de Jullienne, and the print dealer Pierre Jean Mariette. While the various biographies of Watteau contradict each other on the fate of his drawings, the new documents present two important facts: First, that it was Watteau's estate itself that went to his family, and not the proceeds of its sale, as suggested by Gersaint; and that Gersaint failed to mention the role played by Nicolas Henin, who was as much the “guardian,” in the legal sense, of Watteau's belongings as Gersaint himself.