Angelica and Medoro

A princess from Cathay and a wounded Moorish soldier fall in love in a green wood full of cupids. Boucher painted them in 1763, and Diderot was not amused.

The story behind the painting

François Boucher painted Angelica and Medoro in 1763. Together with Jupiter and Callisto, which can be seen as its companion, it was shown at the Paris Salon of 1765. Its title did not stay fixed: when the two pictures were sold in 1789 it was listed as Bacchus and Ariadne, and when the oval picture was sold in 1851 it was called Venus and Adonis. After several changes of owner it entered the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1982, through the bequest of the Jack and Belle Linsky Collection.

What to look for

The two lovers are set in a natural landscape, surrounded by putti. Other painters of this subject, such as Toussaint Dubreuil, showed Medoro carving the lovers' names into the bark of a tree. Boucher does something else: his Medoro is picking a garland of roses. Angelica is shown nude, though seen from behind. The canvas is modest in size, about 67 by 56 cm, and the whole scene is wrapped in the soft greenery and playful cherubs typical of the painter.

Meaning and intent

The story comes from a famous episode of Ariosto's Orlando Furioso. Angelica, daughter of the ruler of Cathay, that is China, keeps fleeing the knights who love her, among them the paladin Orlando. One day she finds Medoro, a young Moorish foot soldier wounded while trying to recover the body of his king Dardinello. She falls in love with him, he with her, and before leaving they carve their names on the trees to seal their love. Boucher's rose garland was, in his time, an allusion to deflowering, here Angelica's.

Legacy

Boucher drew his inspiration from an opera based on the poem, Roland, with a libretto by Philippe Quinault and music by Jean-Baptiste Lully. Not everyone admired the result. Denis Diderot judged the painting fiercely, accusing the artist of choosing the subject only as an excuse to paint a female nude, even one seen from the back. Today the picture belongs to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, part of the Linsky bequest, where its changing names and Diderot's barbs are part of its story.