Jean-Howard Fragonard

1732-1806

European Artist

Born in the small city of Grasse, France, Fragonard moved to Paris with his family in 1738. While still in his teens, he apprenticed to Jean-Baptiste-Simeon Chardin for six months and then worked in Francois Boucher's studio. He won the Prix de Rome in 1752, and then spent three preparatory years at the Academie de France in Rome from 1756 to 1761. Fragonard also drew landscapes with Hubert Robert and traveled to southern Italy and Venice. Life and paint seen through his lightning brush were delicious; his cheerful canvases reinvigorated the Rococo style. He painted mythology, gallantry, landscape, and portraiture and drew voraciously in wide-ranging media, often signing his works "Frago." The French Revolution ended Fragonard's career and made him a pauper. Fragonard died forgotten in Napoleon's France.