Sign in or join

See it hung

Music and Dance

Look first

  • What catches your attention?
  • Where does your eye go next?
  • What would you ask about this work?
Show me

Start with the putti piping at left, with a tambourine at their feet, then follow the dancers toward the fountain.

Skip to the reading

This canvas and its companion, Cupids in Conspiracy, were painted to hang above the doors of a room in a French house, though no one knows whose house or who ordered them. Such over-door paintings joined fine art to interior decoration in wealthy French homes. Here putti play music by a fountain while others dance hand in hand.

Spot an error?

oil on canvas · Framed: 77.5 x 131.5 x 6 cm · Cleveland Museum of Art · Rococo

Read more at the Cleveland Museum of Art

Sources

Look again

What do you notice now?

Try a quick sketch

Take a minute to sketch on any paper. No upload needed.

What did you draw first? What did you leave out?

Details and source

Museum title
Music and Dance
Artist
François Boucher (French, 1703–1770)
Date
1740s
Medium
oil on canvas
Dimensions
Framed: 77.5 x 131.5 x 6 cm (30 1/2 x 51 3/4 x 2 3/8 in.); Unframed: 69 x 123 cm (27 3/16 x 48 7/16 in.)
Credit line
Gift of the Louis Dudley Beaumont Foundation
Image license
CC0 1.0 · Public domain
Museum record
Cleveland Museum of Art

Artist’s life 1703–1770

Rococo c. 1720–1770s

View in the Atlas

Galler’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.

Music and Dance · François Boucher, 1740s
Fit
MuseumM
Shortcuts ?
Enter
Look closer
+ −
Zoom in / out
0
Fit the whole artwork
← → ↑ ↓
Pan the image while zoomed
← →
Previous / next artwork, outside this view
M
Enter or return to the museum
Esc
Close this view; press again to enter the museum

Tab moves between controls. Browser zoom shortcuts stay available.

Music and Dance, François Boucher

+ − Zoom · Arrow keys pan · M Museum · Esc Close