The Delicate Musician

For a long time she was shown alone, a young woman with a big long-necked lute called a theorbo, turning her head to catch your eye. Then in 2009 the Louvre's own laboratory found that her panel and a second small Watteau, L'Indifferent, showing a young man caught in mid-step, had been sawn from a single board. She had been playing for him all along, her strings keeping the beat for his dance. Watteau made the pair around 1717, the year the Academie invented a new category simply to admit him, the fete galante, scenes of well-dressed people idling at music and love in a park. Her nickname, La Finette, points at the sly, teasing look on her face. Whoever later split the two panels left her tuned and mid-phrase, her partner gone from the frame.