This expressive sheet is a study for the man's head in Watteau's painting Mezzetin, also in the Museum's collection (34.138). Mezzetin was a character in the popular commedia dell'arte, typically amorous and sentimental. In the Museum's painting, he sits on a stone bench outside a building, playing a guitar and gazing plaintively at an unseen window. The artist placed a female garden statue in the woods behind the Mezzetin, its back turned to the actor, suggesting an unrequited love. In this robust red and black study, Watteau established the angle of the head, the uplifted eyes, and the parted lips that were carried over into the painting. In its emotional force and the melding of the two colors of chalk, this sheet recalls the precedent of Rubens, an artist much admired by Watteau.
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Jules Niel (French), according to the Biron sale catalogue.; Gabrielle Niel; Guillaume de Gontaut-Biron, marquis de Biron , his sale, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, June 9-11, 1914, lot 63, bought in, (then re-entered the Biron collection, Geneva, and was acquired by the MMA in 1937).
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Art Treasures of the Metropolitan," November 7, 1952–September 7, 1953.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries," November 14, 1970–June 1, 1971.
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. "Watteau, 1684-1721," June 17, 1984–September 23, 1984.
Réunion des Musées Nationaux - Grand Palais. "Watteau, 1684-1721," October 23, 1984–January 28, 1985.
Schloss Charlottenburg. "Watteau, 1684-1721," February 22, 1985–May 26, 1985.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Drawings and Prints: Selections from the Permanent Collection," April 14–July 20, 1997.
Bean and Turcic 1986.333; Rosenberg and Prat 1999.615 (vol. II)
Josephine Lansing Allen "Drawings from the Biron Collection." in The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, vol. 33, New York, March 1938, pp. 77-78, ill.
Hermann Warner Williams, Jr. "Some French Drawings from the Biron Collection." Art Quarterly. vol. 2, Winter 1939, fig. no. 2, pp. 48-55, ill.
Walter Mehring European Drawings from the Collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art: A Portfolio of Collotype Reproductions [Vol. 1: Italian Drawings; Vol. 2: Flemish, Dutch, German, Spanish, French, and British drawings; Vol. 3: "New Series": Italian, Flemish, Dutch, German, Spanish, French, and British drawings]. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 3 vols., New York, 1942–44, also N.S., no. 36., cat. no. 31 (vol.2), fig. no. 31, ill.
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Hans Tietze European Master Drawings in the United States. J. J. Augustin, New York, 1947, cat. no. 83, pp. 166-167.
Regina Shoolman, Charles E. Slatkin Six Centuries of French Master Drawings in America. Oxford University Press, New York, 1950, fig. no. pl. 25, p. 42, ill.
Art Treasures of the Metropolitan: A Selection from the European and Asiatic Collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Harry N. Abrams, Inc., New York, 1952, cat. no. 62, pp. 69, 222, ill.
Karl Theodore Parker, Jacques Mathey Catalogue de l'oeuvre dessiné d'Antoine Watteau. vol. 2, Paris, 1957, cat. no. 726.
"MMA Bulletin" French Drawings. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, vol. 17, no. 6, New York, February 1959, p. 166, ill.
Jacob Bean 100 European Drawings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: New York Graphic Society, 1964, cat. no. 56, ill.
James Byam Shaw "The Biron Collection of Venetian Eighteenth-Century Drawings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art." The Metropolitan Museum Journal. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, vol. 3, New York, 1971, fig. no. 21, p. 257.
Linda Boyer Gillies, Colta Ives French Drawings and Prints of the Eighteenth Century. Ex. cat. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1972, cat. no. 46.
Margaret Morgan Grasselli, Pierre Rosenberg Watteau, 1684-1721. Ex. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., Washington, 1984, cat. no. D110, under P49, fig. no. 8, pp. 188, 364-365, ill.
Donald Posner Antoine Watteau. Ithaca, New York, 1984, fig. no. pl. 49, pp. 206, 208.
Marianne Roland Michel Watteau. Un Artiste au XVIIIe siècle. Paris, 1984, fig. no. pl. XXX, p. 143.
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Pierre Rosenberg, Louis-Antoine Prat Antoine Watteau 1684-1721: Catalogue raisonné des dessins. Milan, 1996, cat. no. 615 (vol. II), pp. 1048-1049, ill.
Alan Wintermute, The Frick Collection, National Gallery of Canada Watteau and His World: French Drawings from 1700-1750. Exh. cat. 1999-2000, cat. no. 40, pp. 170-171, ill.
Pierre Rosenberg, Georgia J. Cowart Watteau, Music, and Theater. Exh. cat. Edited by Katharine Baetjer, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2009, cat. no. 31, pp. 84-85, ill.
Assistant Curator Allison Rudnick invites readers to view one highlight from the Department of Drawings and Prints' remarkable collection every week through April 2017.
Jean Antoine Watteau's Mezzetin is among the Museum's most evocative works. Katharine Baetjer, curator in the Department of European Paintings, spoke with Associate Email Marketing Manager Jennette Mullaney about this small, striking painting.
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The Met's collection of drawings and prints—one of the most comprehensive and distinguished of its kind in the world—began with a gift of 670 works from Cornelius Vanderbilt, a Museum trustee, in 1880.
