Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin
French, 1699–1779
BiographyJean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin was born in Paris on 2 November 1699, son of the master cabinetmaker Jean Chardin. He was the pupil of the history painters Pierre-Jacques Cazes (1676-1754) and Noël-Nicolas Coypel (1690-1734). Chardin was accepted into the Académie de Saint-Luc as a painter of still lifes in 1724, and became a member of the Académie Royale de Peinture et Sculpture in 1728. He was elected a council member of the latter in 1743 and served as treasurer from 1755 to 1775. In 1733, Chardin began painting genre scenes in addition to still lifes. His charming small canvases, depicting modest scenes of one or two figures, and the humble, everyday objects of middle-class life, were in the tradition of the Dutch cabinet pictures of the preceding century that enjoyed such popularity among French collectors at this time. Characterized by a simplicity and directness of vision, and a complete avoidance of sentimentality and affectation, Chardin's work represents a naturalistic tendency in French eighteenth-century painting that existed alongside the more fashionable and flamboyant Rococo. His technical mastery achieved great depth of tone through the use of a loaded brush and a subtle use of scumbled color. Failing eyesight forced Chardin to turn to the medium of pastels towards the end of his life. He died in his apartment at the Louvre, in Paris, on 6 December 1779. Among Chardin's pupils was Jean-Honoré Fragonard.