Wall Bracket

This bracket is one of the most accomplished pieces made in Rouen in the exuberant rocaille style fashionable in France about 1730−50. The style was inspired by nature, especially shells, and the composition was typically asymmetrical. The central scene here depicts the beginning of a famous licentious tale by Jean de la Fontaine (1621−95) in which a flighty husband seduces a pretty serving girl as she is gathering flowers in his garden, while a neighbor observes the scene from her window. The Rouen potter closely followed a print made in the early 1740s by Nicolas de Larmessin after a painting by Nicolas Lancret, The Servant Justified, now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.