COCHIN, Charles-Nicolas I
(b. 1688, Paris, d. 1754, Paris)

'Pour garder l'honneur d'une belle'

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Engraving
British Museum, London

Cochin executed this engraving after a painting by Jean-Antoine Watteau. The painting is lost and it now exists only in this engraving. Here the Commedia dell'arte characters appear in traditional guise. The setting is quite clearly a stage, and there is a stiffness in the grouping of the actor-figures - slenderly proportioned in typically Gillot style. Yet here are all the elements out of which would be fused shortly afterwards the complete creation of Watteau's fêtes galantes.