Plate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au Roy

Art Historical Context

Step into the enchanting world of 18th-century French with this etching plate from *Fables Nouvelles, Dées au Roy* (New Fables Dedicated to the), created in 1719. by Claude Gillot—a pioneering painter and engraver who influenced Antoine Watteau and the Rococo style—in collaboration with engraver Grégoire Dupuis andulist Antoine Houdar de Motte, it depicts *The Fish and the Fireworks Fable Sixteen. Produced during the Regency period under Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, while young Louis XV ascended the throne, the book reflects the era's delight in moralistic tales echoing Jean de La Fontaine's tradition, but with fresh wit dedicated to royal patronage. This small etching (3 3/16 × 4 in.), part of a luxurious book (10 1/16 × 8 1/8 × 1 7/16 in.), showcases etching's precision for intricate lines and textures, ideal for capturing whimsical scenes. Fireworks, a tag highlighting its subject, evoke the period's fascination with pyrotechnic spectacles at court fêtes, symbolizing fleeting grandeur in fables that often critiqued human folly through animal protagonists. Gillot's lively draftsmanship bridges Baroque exuberance and emerging Rococo elegance. Housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Drawings and Prints department (Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1934), this plate offers a window into Enlightenment-era print culture, where art and literature intertwined to amuse and instruct the elite. A delightful nod to the era's explosive entertainments!

About the Artist

Claude Gillot|Gregoire Dupuis|Lamotte-Houdar · 1673–1722

Artist known for his elegant designs done in the Rococo manner of Audran; also for his predilection for scenes from the 'comedia dell'arte.' Few paintings survive; his work is known mainly through drawings and etchings. Comment on works: Genre; History