Detail of Return from Market by Boucher in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, June 2010

Return from Market
1767
François Boucher, French, 1703–1770

Dimensions: 209.6 x 290.5 cm (82 1/2 x 114 3/8 in.)

Medium or Technique: Oil on canvas

Classification: Paintings
Type: Genre - Exterior; Oversize - Horizontal

Accession Number: 71.3

Return from Market was probably commissioned as a companion piece to Halt at the Spring [MFA Object No. 71.2]. Boucher, who objected to the natural world because it was "too green and badly lit," created in these works a decorative fiction of billowing clouds and draperies, with abundant, rhythmically interwoven figures and animals. Dashing brushwork, delicate colors, and lighthearted sensuousness are hallmarks of Boucher's work and embody the high style of his period.

Text from: www.mfa.org/collections/object/return-from-market-30846