François BOUCHER French 1703–1770 The mysterious basket 1748 oil on canvas 92.0 x 78.6. cm Purchased through The Art Foundation of Victoria with the assistance of Coles Myer Ltd, Fellow, Mr Henry Krongold CBE and Mrs Dinah Krongold, Founder Benefactors, and the Westpac Banking Corporation, Founder Benefactor 1982 E2-1982		Boucher painted seven works based on the play Les Vendanges de Tempé by Charles-Simon Favart. It is the love story of the shepherdess Lisette and the 'Little Shepherd', centred around the trials that their relationship endured before they gained parental consent for their marriage. The mysterious basket is taken from scene four where the Little Shepherd brings to a sleeping Lisette a basket of flowers which he conveniently uses to hide a letter for her. The enjoyable lesson is from scene five, where the Little Shepherd is teaching Lisette how to play the flute. The erotic overtones of the scene are clearly not ignored by Boucher who posed the figures in an intimate and blatantly suggestive way. Boucher was influential in rejuvenating the 'pastoral landscape', and he infused his scenes with a degree of sentimentality combined with an accomplished, rich painting technique. These characteristics were taken to an extreme level by those who followed him and led to a backlash against his style of painting and made him an unjust target of criticism.
		List other works from the Master's Eye exhibition