Portrait of Marguerite Le Comte

Portrait of Marguerite Le Comte

Claude Henri Watelet

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This rare proof state of Watelet's etching is based on a drawing by art student Étine Lavallée-Poussin (2013.181). It depicts Watelet's mistress and traveling companion Marguerite Le Comte seated at a table on their visit to Rome in 1764. In etching the plate, Watelet made certain additions to Lavallée-Poussin's composition, adding details such as the etching tools and the print unfurled over the table edge that identify Le Comte as an amateur printmaker.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Portrait of Marguerite Le ComtePortrait of Marguerite Le ComtePortrait of Marguerite Le ComtePortrait of Marguerite Le ComtePortrait of Marguerite Le Comte

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.