The Dreamer (painting)

The Dreamer
The Dreamer
fr: La Rêveuse
Artist	Antoine Watteau
Year	c. 1712–1717; See § Provenance and dating
Catalogue	H 45; G 88; DV 166; R 100; HA 145; EC 165; RM 120; RT 79
Medium	oil on panel
Dimensions	23.2 cm × 17 cm (9.1 in × 6.7 in)
Location	Art Institute, Chicago
Accession	1960.305

The Dreamer (La Rêveuse) is an oil on panel painting of c. 1712–1717 in the Art Institute, Chicago, by the French Rococo artist Antoine Watteau. The painting is a single-figure, full-length composition that shows a seated young woman amid a landscape, dressed in somewhat an exotic attire consisting of long red gown with fur garment and white bonnet; it is a recurring subject that is also present in numerous paintings and drawings by Watteau such as The Coquettes, dit Actors of the Comédie-Française. There were attempts to identify the sitter of the painting, who was notably thought to be Watteau's contemporary, the Comédie-Française actress Charlotte Desmares.

In the early 18th century, The Dreamer belonged to the Abbé Pierre-Maurice Haranger, canon at the Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois who was one of Watteau's closest friends. During two centuries, the painting passed through various private collections, until coming into possession of the art dealer and connoisseur Georges Wildenstein, who sold it to the Art Institute of Chicago in 1960.

Exhibition history

List of major exhibitions featuring the work
Year	Title	Location	Cat. no.
1874	Ouvrages de peinture exposés au profit de la colonisation de l’Algérie par les Alsaciens-Lorrains au Palais de la Présidence ou Corps législatif…	Société de protection des alsaciens et lorrains demeurés français, Paris	526
1883–1884	L’Art du XVIIIe siècle	Galerie Georges Petit, Paris	145
1943	Fashion in Headdress 1450 - 1943	Wildenstein & Company Building, New York City	36
1956	De Watteau a Prud’hon	Gazette des Beaux-Arts, Paris	95
1959	Age of Elegance: The Rococo and its Effect	Museum of Art, Baltimore	35
1975	The Age of Louis XV: French Painting 1710-1774	Museum of Art, Toledo	120
1976	Selected Works of 18th Century French Art in the Collections of the Art Institute of Chicago	Art Institute, Chicago	2
1984–1985	Watteau 1684–1721	National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Galeries nationales du Grand Palais, Paris; Charlottenburg Palace, Berlin	P. 26
General references: Grasselli, Rosenberg & Parmantier 1984, p. 306, Wise & Warner 1996, p. 170.

Adhémar, Hélène (1950). Watteau; sa vie, son oeuvre (in French). Includes "L’univers de Watteau", an introduction by René Huyghe. Paris: P. Tisné. p. 219; pl. 77; cat. no. 145. OCLC 853537.
Boerlin-Brodbeck, Yvonne (1973). Antoine Watteau und das Theater (Ph.D. dissertation) (in German). Basel: Universität Basel. pp. 171, 176, 318 n. 435. OCLC 1965328.
Börsch-Supan, Helmut [in German] (2000). Antoine Watteau, 1684-1721. Meister der französischen Kunst (in German). Köln: Könemann. p. 75; fig. 64. ISBN 3-8290-1630-1. OCLC 925262301.
Camesasca, Ettore [in Portuguese] (1971). The Complete Painting of Watteau. Classics of the World's Great Art. Introduction by John Sutherland. New York: Harry N. Abrams. p. 115, cat. no. 165. ISBN 9780810955257. LCCN 77092260. OCLC 143069. SBN 8109-5525-3 – via the Internet Archive.
Dacier, Émile; Vuaflart, Albert (1922). "Jean de Julienne et les graveurs de Watteau au XVIII-e siècle. III. Catalogue". Jean de Jullienne et les Graveurs de Watteau Au Xviii. Siècle (in French). Paris: M. Rousseau. p. 82, cat. no. 166. doi:10.11588/DIGLIT.41977. OCLC 1039156495.
Ferré, Jean, ed. (1972). Watteau (in French). Madrid: Éditions Athena. vol. 1, pp. 206–207, 214; vol. 4, pp. 1111, 1120. OCLC 906101135.
Fourcaud, Louis de (November 1904). "Antoine Watteau: scenes et figures galantes". La Revue de l'art ancien et moderne (in French). 16 (92): 341–356 – via the Internet Archive.
Goncourt, Edmond de (1875). Catalogue raisonné de l'oeuvre peint, dessiné et gravé d'Antoine Watteau (in French). Paris: Rapilly. p. 82, cat. no. 88. OCLC 1041772738 – via the Internet Archive.
Grasselli, Margaret Morgan; Rosenberg, Pierre; Parmantier, Nicole; et al. (1984). Watteau, 1684-1721 ; National Gallery of Art, June 17—September 23, 1984; Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, October 23, 1984—January 28, 1985; Schloss Charlottenburg, Berlin, February 22—May 26, 1985 (PDF). Washington: National Gallery of Art. ISBN 0-89468-074-9. LCCN 84-4918. OCLC 557740787 – via the National Gallery of Art archive.
Grasselli, Margaret Morgan (1987). The Drawings of Antoine Watteau: Stylistic Development and Problems of Chronology (Ph.D. dissertation). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University. p. 208, fig. 227. OCLC 1110196330.
Hédouin, P. [in French] (November 30, 1845). "Watteau: catalogue de son oeuvre". L'Artiste (in French). pp. 78–80 – via Gallica. p. 78, cat. no. 45{{cite magazine}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
Hédouin, P. (1856). Mosaïque. Peintres, musiciens, littérateurs, artistes dramatiques à partir du 15e siècle jusqu'à nos jours (in French). Paris: Heugel. p. 98, cat. no. 45. OCLC 1157159285 – via the Internet Archive.
Herold, Jacques; Vuaflart, Albert (1929). Jean de Julienne et les graveurs de Watteau au XVIII-e siècle. I. Notices et documents biographiques (in French). Paris: M. Rousseau. pp. 117–118, 264. doi:10.11588/DIGLIT.41975. OCLC 1039157338.
Mollett, John William (1883). Watteau. Illustrated Biographies of the Great Artists. London: S. Low, Marston, Searle & Rivington. p. 66. OCLC 557720162 – via the Internet Archive.
Nemilova, I. S. (1964). Ватто и его произведения в Эрмитаже (Watteau et son œuvre à l'Ermitage) [Watteau and His Works in the Hermitage] (in Russian). Leningrad: Sovetskiy hudozhnik. OCLC 67871342.
Nemilova, I. S. (1989) [first published in 1973]. Загадки старых картин [Enigmas of Old Masters] (in Russian) (3rd ed.). Moscow: Izobrazitel'noe iskusstvo. ISBN 5-85200-017-5. OCLC 909190011.
Posner, Donald (1984). Antoine Watteau. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. pp. 47, 256, fig. 39. ISBN 0-297-78324-6. LCCN 84164937. OCLC 10736607 – via the Internet Archive.
Réau, Louis (1928–1930). "Watteau". In Dimier, Louis (ed.). Les peintres français du XVIII-e siècle: Histoire des vies et catalogue des œuvres (in French). Vol. 1. Paris: G. Van Oest. pp. 38–39, cat. no. 100. OCLC 564527521.
Roland Michel, Marianne (1980). Antoine Watteau: das Gesamtwerk (in German). Translated from the French by Rudolf Kimmig. Frankfurt: Ullstein. p. 44, cat. no. 120. ISBN 3-548-36019-X. OCLC 69202887.
Roland Michel, Marianne (1984). Watteau: un artiste au XVIII-e siècle. Paris: Flammarion. pp. 156–157; ill. 142. ISBN 0862940494. OCLC 417153549.
Temperini, Renaud (2002). Watteau. Maîtres de l'art (in French). Paris: Gallimard. pp. 84, 145; cat. no. 79. ISBN 2-07-011686-7. OCLC 300225840.
Wildenstein, Georges (1920). Lancret. Paris: G. Servant. p. 117; cat. no. 704; fig. 202. OCLC 1088910286 – via the Internet Archive.
Wise, Susan; Warner, Malcolm (1996). French and British Paintings from 1600 to 1800 in the Art Institute of Chicago: a Catalogue of the Collection. Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, Princeton University Press. p. 169–174. ISBN 0-86559-137-7. LCCN 96031742. OCLC 1244799003 – via the Internet Archive.