Detail of A Young Peasant Boy by Greuze in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, December 2010

Head of a Young Boy
1763


Object Details

Artist: Jean-Baptiste Greuze (French, Tournus 1725–1805 Paris)

Date: 1763

Medium: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 18 7/8 x 15 3/8 in. (47.9 x 39.1 cm)

Classification: Paintings

Credit Line: The Friedsam Collection, Bequest of Michael Friedsam, 1931

Accession Number: 32.100.137


Greuze exhibited this character study of a young boy at the Salon of 1763, at which it belonged to the celebrated drawings collector Pierre Jean Mariette (1694–1774). Relatively rough brushwork—the individual strokes are not disguised—is used throughout. This is deliberate, and typical of studies that Greuze made from models rather than commissioned portraits.


Text from: www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/436588