Mezzetin, c.1718/20 Jean Antoine Watteau (1684-1721)

We create our paintings with museum quality and covering the highest academic standards. Once we get your order, it will be entirely hand-painted with oil on canvas. All the materials we use are the highest level, being totally artist graded painting materials and linen canvas.

We will add 1.6" (4 cm) additional blank canvas all over the painting for stretching.

High quality and detailing in every inch are time consuming. The reproduction of Jean Antoine Watteau also needs time to dry in order to be completely ready for shipping, as this is crucial to not be damaged during transportation.
Based on the size, level of detail and complexity we need 8-9 weeks to complete the process.

In case the delivery date needs to be extended in time, or we are overloaded with requests, there will be an email sent to you sharing the new timelines of production and delivery.

TOPofART wants to remind you to keep patient, in order to get you the highest quality, being our mission to fulfill your expectations.

We not stretch and frame our oil paintings due to several reasons:
Painting reproduction is a high quality expensive product, which we cannot risk to damage by sending it being stretched.
Also, there are postal restrictions, regarding the size of the shipment.
Additionally, due to the dimensions of the stretched canvas, the shipment price may exceed the price of the product itself.

You can stretch and frame your painting in your local frame-shop.

Once the painting Mezzetin is ready and dry, it will be shipped to your delivery address. The canvas will be rolled-up in a secure postal tube.

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The paintings we create are only of museum quality. Our academy graduated artists will never allow a compromise in the quality and detail of the ordered painting. TOPofART do not work, and will never allow ourselves to work with low quality studios from the Far East. We are based in Europe, and quality is our highest priority.

In "Mezzetin," Jean Antoine Watteau paints a whimsical scene that feels like a moment plucked from a delicate reverie. The figure of Mezzetin, a character from the Italian commedia dell’arte, lounges with his guitar in hand, lost in a world of romantic melancholy. His striped costume - all ruffled collar and breeches - gives him an air of playful mischief, but there’s an unmistakable sadness in his posture. His head tilts to one side, as though straining to hear a distant, elusive note, while the guitar rests limply in his lap. The figure seems frozen between performance and despair, his song unplayed, his serenade unanswered.

Watteau’s palette is soft and muted, with gentle greens, pinks, and silvers that echo the quiet, dreamy quality of the scene. The overgrown garden in which Mezzetin stands is rendered with Watteau’s signature lightness of touch, the foliage appearing almost to shimmer in the filtered light. There’s an ethereal quality to the trees and bushes, as if the whole landscape exists on the edge of reality, just a step away from vanishing into mist. In the background, a statue of a woman turns her back to Mezzetin, a subtle but poignant reminder of his unrequited love. Watteau uses this small gesture to quietly amplify the character’s longing, making the scene as much about absence as presence.

The composition is intimate, yet rich with detail. Mezzetin dominates the foreground, his colorful figure sharply contrasted against the lush, dark greenery behind him. Watteau’s brushwork is delicate, especially in the hands and clothing, capturing the lightness of fabric and the softness of skin with exquisite precision. Every fold of Mezzetin’s costume seems alive, fluttering gently in the still air. It’s a painting that speaks to Watteau’s fascination with the theater of life, where comedy and tragedy dance side by side, and the smallest gestures tell the deepest stories.