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Source Description
François Boucher was known for romantic, idealized pastoral scenes and produced relatively few religious works. This drawing, however, is believed to relate to the Old Testament story in which Jacob travels to Canaan with his family. Boucher used a limited palette of brown, red, and black to create dramatic shadows and highlights. The family is seen basking in the dappled sunlight that illuminates the mother and her baby as they rest beneath a palm tree. The sheet may have served as a preparatory study for a similar painting by Boucher that is lost today and known only through a reproductive engraving by the printmaker Elisabeth Cousinet-Lempereur.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
150501
label
The Departure of Jacob
core
obj
dtoType
drawing
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
150501
contentType
drawing
title
The Departure of Jacob
description
François Boucher was known for romantic, idealized pastoral scenes and produced relatively few religious works. This drawing, however, is believed to relate to the Old Testament story in which Jacob travels to Canaan with his family. Boucher used a limited palette of brown, red, and black to create dramatic shadows and highlights. The family is seen basking in the dappled sunlight that illuminates the mother and her baby as they rest beneath a palm tree. The sheet may have served as a preparatory study for a similar painting by Boucher that is lost today and known only through a reproductive engraving by the printmaker Elisabeth Cousinet-Lempereur.
date
c. 1755
citation
rights
CC0
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
wikidata
Q79933045
creators
1888
genreSpecific
Drawing
imageCount
1
source
import
dimensionsRaw
Sheet: 34.8 x 23.1 cm (13 11/16 x 9 1/8 in.)
cul
France, 18th century
accession
1981.58
Source extras
tec
Pen and brown-black ink, brown ink wash, and red chalk wash, with black chalk on cream laid paper
tombstone
The Departure of Jacob, c. 1755. François Boucher (French, 1703–1770). Pen and brown-black ink, brown ink wash, and red chalk wash, with black chalk on cream laid paper; sheet: 34.8 x 23.1 cm (13 11/16 x 9 1/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Delia E. Holden and L. E. Holden Funds, 1981.58
supportMaterials
description
cream(3) laid paper
collection
DR - French
inscriptions
inscription
ON THREE SEPERATELY APPLIED PIECES OF PAPER (now removed and in departmental file), inscribed in black ink: T[illegible] / Dessin à la[illegible] / Boucher - [illegible] / chez Paulme [illegible] 19[illegible] / [illegible] ; printed in black ink: THOS [S superscript] AGNEW & SONS LTD [TD superscript] / Nº 44133 / LONDON, / 43 OLD BOND STREET / PICCADILLY, W1X 4BA ; printed in black ink: Place de la Borde, Nº 2, près St [t superscript]-Augustin / ALEXANDRE / JOUANEST / DOREUR / Fabricant de bordures dorées / pour tableaux, estampes, / glaces, gouaches et des- / sins, et se charge de / l'encadrement. / A PARIS.
didYouKnow
The gesture between the couple in this drawing -- in which the man offers the woman a pear -- is seen in several other works by François Boucher.
citations
citation
Ananoff, Alexandre. <em>François Boucher</em>. Lausanne: La Bibliothèque des Arts, 1976.
page_number
Mentioned and reproduced: vol. I, pp. 171-172, under no. 34
citation
<em>Master Drawings</em>. London: Thos. Agnew & Sons Ltd., 1977.
page_number
Mentioned and reproduced: no. 32
citation
"The Year in Review for 1981." <em>Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art</em> (February 1982): 41-80.
page_number
Mentioned: pp. 41, 80; Reproduced: p. 49
citation
Goldfarb, Hilliard T. "Boucher's <em>Pastoral Scene with Family at Rest </em>and the Image of the Pastoral in Eighteenth-Century France." <em>Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art</em> (March 1984): 82-89.
page_number
Mentioned and reproduce: pp. 82-89
citation
Laing, Alastair. "Boucher et la pastorale peinte." <em>Revue de l'art</em> 73 (1986): 55-64.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 61 n. 3
citation
<em>Dessins français des XVIIIe et XIXe siècles du Musée de Picardie</em>. Exh. Cat. Amiens: Musée de Picardie, 1997.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 50, under no. 1
citation
DeGrazia, Diane, and Carter E. Foster. <em>Master Drawings from the Cleveland Museum of Art</em>. Exh. Cat. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2000.
page_number
Mentioned: p. 10, pp. 102-103, 288, no. 37; Reproduced: p. 103
creditline
Delia E. Holden and L. E. Holden Funds
updatedAt
2026-05-29 07:45:54.585000
sourceId
150501
dept
Drawings
coll
DR - French
med
Pen and brown-black ink, brown ink wash, and red chalk wash, with black chalk on cream laid paper
creatorTags
male
thumbnail_url
image_url
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
9feada6218c26059