The Italian Comedy

Watteau arrived in Paris only in 1702, and was “agréé” (approved) by the Académie Royale in 1712. Only in 1717 did he deliver his Pilgrimage to Cythera (Paris, Musée du Louvre) as his obligatory reception piece, in relation to which the Académie recognised the pictorial genre of the “fêtes galantes”, originated by Watteau. Since this artist’s working technique was not especially meticulous, the original painterly quality of many of his pictures is barely recognizable. Despite this, the two Berlin theatre pictures are extraordinarily well preserved, and are among the most beautiful exemplars of his art. They owe their titles, and hence a reference to their relatedness as pendants, to a pair of reproductive engravings by Charles-Nicolas Cochin the Elder from 1734. Frederick the Great purchased both pictures before 1769 for his gallery in Sanssouci. In 1829, they were delivered to the new Gemäldegalerie in Berlin. The Italian Comedy is the only nocturnal scene Watteau painted. Twelve actors from the Commedia dell’arte have gathered, also in a clearing. Standing at the centre with a guitar is Pierrot, and alongside him Colombine (with the mask) and Isabella, who turns towards the old Pantalone. On the right next to Pierrot, we see Harlequin in an attitude of alarm, Pulcinella (?), Mezzetin with a torch, the doctor Marcisino, who supports himself with a cane, and Scaramuccia. In this picture (as we read in the announcement accompanying the engraved reproduction of 1734), Watteau painted his costumed friends. It can therefore be regarded as a kind of final scene, a “vaudeville” of all performances, in which Watteau has fused characters from the Italian comedy with the nocturnal atmosphere, which is to say the illusion of the theatre and of reality. Numerous preparatory drawings for both pictures have survived. Hennig Bock | 200 Masterpieces of European Painting - Gemäldegalerie Berlin, 2019