BEIN PLAYING CARDS GEN 132: Title card pasted to sleeve. Formerly owned by Julia Parker Wightman. From the Cary Collection of Playing Cards. and Title card and 25 numbered cards depicting inhabitants of various countries.
"Portrait of French playwright Molière, after Bourdon; three-quarter length, sitting at desk, directed to left, hands folded on table, wearing long curled wig and loose-fitting gown; in rectangular frame, with spread wings and ivy in upper part, and attributes of comedy in lower part. ... Ribbon at bottom with verses [in Latin] by Horat."--British Museum online catalogue, description of a variant state
Alternative Title:
Jean Baptiste Poquelin de Molière
Description:
Title from from text within cartouche at top of image., Variant state, lacking imprint statement and with verses from Chenier engraved below image instead of a dedication. For a different state with the imprint "A Paris chez le Sr De Mailly, Quay de l'Ecole près le Louvre Avec Privilége du Roy", see British Museum online catalogue, registration no.: R,6.236., Place and date of publication from the Philadelphia Museum of Art online collection database, accession no.: 1943-50-23., Sheet trimmed within plate mark and multilated in lower left corner, resulting in partial loss of artist's name., Window mounted to 51 x 36 cm., and Mounted opposite page 187 (leaf numbered '228' in pencil) in volume 1 of an extra-illustrated copy of: Moore, T. Memoirs of the life of the Right Honourable Richard Brinsley Sheridan.
A single-horse carriage is stopped in front of a rustic inn or roadhouse, with two caricatured Frenchmen (one a postillion wearing enormous boots) engaged in changing out the horse. An occupant of the carriage hands money out the window to a peasant woman holding an infant and accompanied by a young boy; two other shabbily dressed figures are nearby next to a tree, one of them playing a makeshift drum. In the doorway of the building stands a young woman, and to the left a man under an archway stands with arms crossed; both watch the scene unfold. In the background a postillion rides away on horseback, whip extended into the air
Alternative Title:
Changing horses on the road to Paris
Description:
Title from dealer's description., Signed by the artist in lower left., and One of five views by the artist F.G. Byron that record his visit to France in 1790; they were exhibited at the Society of Artists the following year. This drawing was exhibited under the title "Changing horses on the road to Paris" (Society of Artists, 1791, no. 39).
Subject (Geographic):
Clermont (France) and France.
Subject (Topic):
Carriages & coaches, Horses, Taverns (Inns), Postillions, French, Peasants, Country life, Ethnic stereotypes, and Drums (Musical instruments)