Jean Siméon Chardin (1699-1779) (after) Jean Baptiste Siméon Chardin. After 1771. Engraved by Chevillet. 245x342mm. Bocher 9. Fine proof on white vellum. Light foxing. Good margins, bottom margin filled. The pastel used as a model for this engraving, dating from 1771, is preserved in the Musée du Louvre. Another version, two years later, is in the Musée des beaux-arts d'Orléans. "Chardin was no less than 70 years old when he took up pastel painting to compensate for his health problems, which largely deprived him of the use of his eyes, degraded by decades of grinding pigments. "My infirmities have prevented me from painting in oil; I have turned to pastel," he wrote to the Comte d'Angivillier in 1777. From 1771 to 1779, all he exhibited at each Salon du Louvre were study heads in pastel, whose bold, skilful color the critics admired." (museeorleans.fr).