Arcadian Nymphs Making Music

Arcadian Nymphs Making Music at the Victoria and Albert Museum (1770) was completed in the final year of Boucher's life, painted when he was sixty-seven years old and the decorative Rococo aesthetic he had defined was already being displaced by Neoclassicism. Boucher died in his studio on May 30, 1770, reportedly at his easel, and this painting represents one of his last completed works. The nymphs making music in an Arcadian landscape is among his most characteristic subjects — the idealized outdoor setting, the female figures in graceful poses, the suggestion of musical harmony as a model for social grace. That Boucher continued producing such works to the end of his life, uncompromising in his commitment to beauty and pleasure as the proper ends of painting, represents both artistic integrity and historical poignancy. The V&A's holding of this late work provides a counterpoint to the earlier Pastorale in the same collection.

Soft, chalky palette of pinks, blues, and greens creates the artificial pastoral atmosphere characteristic of Boucher's late work. The figures are arranged in a decorative frieze suited to overdoor or panel placement in aristocratic interiors.