Claude Gillot (Langres 1673-1722 Paris)

Gillot was Jean-Antoine Watteau's (1684-1721) master from 1705 until 1708. Drawings made by the artists from this period are hard to distinguish and they have been often confused. Such was the case with this drawing when it was published as Watteau by K. T. Parker and J. Mathey (op. cit., no. 112). Marianne Roland Michel, however, was the first to recognize this drawing as by Gillot (op. cit., p. 41). She compared the rapid handling of the chalk, mainly seen in the background, with similar drawings by the artist and the attribution was later maintained by Eidelberg, Grasselli and Rosenberg and Prat (op. cit.). Although not a preliminary study, this sheet may be related to the series of four etchings La vie des Satyres (see Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Inv. 2012.136.373.1-4).