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genre

Boilly made his name in the early 1790s thanks to his frivolous scenes that captured the spirit of the late Rococo. After being censured for such subjects during the first years of the French Revolution, he produced a series of patriotic works. He soon returned to genre painting, however, and gained a reputation as a straightforward chronicler of early-nineteenth-century daily life in Paris.

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About the Artist

Louis Léopold Boilly

1761 – 1845

French painter and printmaker. The son of a wood-carver, Arnould Boilly (1764-79), he lived in Douai until 1778, when he went to Arras to receive instruction in trompe l'oeil painting from Dominique Doncre (1743-1820). He moved to Paris in 1785. Between 1789 and 1791 he executed eight small scenes on moralizing and amorous subjects for the Avignon collector Esprit-Claude-François Calvet (1728-1810), including The Visit (1789; Saint-Omer, Musée Hôtel Sandelin). He exhibited at the Salon between 1791 and 1824 and received a gold medal at the Salon of 1804. From the beginning his genre subjects were extremely popular with the public and collectors. In 1833, at a time when his popularity was declining, he was admitted to the Légion d'honneur and the Institut de France.

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