The Judgement of Paris

François Boucher painted The Judgement of Paris around 1763, a late mythological work by the dominant decorative painter of the French Rococo, depicting the famous episode in which the Trojan prince Paris awarded the golden apple of beauty to Venus over Juno and Minerva. By 1763 Boucher was First Painter to the King and his Rococo style was already beginning to seem dated to critics influenced by the emerging Neoclassicism, but his mastery of the sensuous female nude and the decorative mythological composition remained the standard against which younger painters measured themselves. The three goddesses — each displaying her nude form to win Paris's judgment — embody Boucher's fundamental artistic project: the celebration of physical beauty as the central value of painting.

Boucher renders the three goddesses with his characteristic pearly flesh tones and flowing drapery against a warm arcadian landscape. The mature handling shows complete confidence in his decorative Rococo manner, though the composition lacks the energy of his earlier work.