Venus and Nymphs Bathing

Medium: Oil On Canvas
Size: 85 x 100 cm (33.5 x 39.4 in)
Signed: Signed and dated: L J Lagren(ée) 1776

Provenance: The Marquis de Véry, acquired by him from the artist; Noble German collection (to 2006).

Throughout his career Lagrenée kept a livre de raison in which he recorded his work. Published in 1877 by E. de Goncourt, it forms a valuable resource for the study of Lagrenée’s paintings; it lists an impressive oeuvre of four hundred and fifty-seven works. His prolific output is a measure of Lagrenée’s patrons and his success at the Salon, where he exhibited from 1755 to 1798. Of one hundred and fifty pictures Lagrenée exhibited at the Paris Salon, sixty-nine of them were mythological subjects – more than any other eighteenth century painter. The Venus in this painting, sculptural and beautifully observed, is the archetypal Lagrenée female figure.