L'altalena

There is a story behind this one, recorded at the time in 1767. A wealthy man about the court wanted his young mistress painted on a swing, pushed by a bishop, arranged so that he himself could look up at her from below. The painter first asked, a serious religious artist, refused the commission and passed it to Fragonard, who clearly had no such qualms. In the finished picture the pusher in the shadows is no longer a clergyman, and the lover lies in the bushes at lower left, gazing straight up at her as her skirts fly open. Watch her foot as she kicks off a slipper into the air. A little statue of Cupid at the side raises a finger to his lips, telling you to keep the secret. It hangs today in the Wallace Collection in London.