Jean Siméon Chardin (1699-1779) (after) Study of the design. 1757. Engraved by J. Ph. Le Bas. Sight: 330x295mm. Bocher 18. Very fine proof on laid paper, slightly sunned. Margins. Frame (not examined outside the frame). The original painting was exhibited at the Louvre in 1753, under the title Un dessinateur d'après le Mercure de Mr Pigalle. It is now in the Museum of Western Art in Tokyo. "By showing Pigalle's Mercury on a half-chest of drawers, Chardin wanted above all to pay tribute to a friend. Pigalle (1741-1785) had executed the terracotta of his Mercure attachant sa talonnière in Rome, between 1736 and 1740. In 1742, he completed a large marble group for Frederick of Prussia, and the Salon's sympathetic critics placed Chardin and Pigalle among the greatest French artists of the time. In fact, Chardin owned a copy of Le Mercure, mentioned in his inventory after his death in 1779 (estimated at 6 livres!), which he was to reproduce on several occasions in his paintings [...] Pigalle, for his part, did not disdain Chardin, of whom he owned six paintings...". (Pierre Rosenberg, Chardin 1699-1779, exhibition cat., Paris, Grand Palais, RMN, 1979, p.293).