Diana Returning from the Hunt

The painting is one of four related overdoors by Boucher that were all engraved by Claude Augustin Duflos, suggesting that they may belong to a series. Of the other three works, one is currently in Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and the other two are in the Wallace Collection. The inscriptions on the Duflos prints indicate that they were mythological scenes. In the scene thought to represent Diana, the print shows a crescent moon in her hair, further identifying her as the goddess.^[1]

The provenance of the four paintings has been linked to the Folie de Chartres, though this connection remains uncertain. While the works bear no inscriptions indicating ownership, they were listed with this provenance in a Paris sale held from November 18–29, 1834. However, this identification has been contested. Thérèse Burollet has argued that the descriptions in the 1834 sale catalogue are too vague to confirm the paintings' identity, suggesting they could instead be the overdoors from Halaxton Manor. Additionally, the Folie de Chartres pavilion was not constructed until 1769-73 which was too late for the Rococo style of these paintings. It is unlikely that their provenance would have been remembered or recorded a generation later, especially if they were confiscated or lost during the Revolution. If they were genuinely from the Folie, Louis-Philippe would likely have reclaimed them as his father's property.^[1]

One theme from Diana Returning from the Hunt is the commitment to idyllic beauty and femininity, a common theme from the Rococo period. The figures's partial nudity, bare skin, graceful poses, and loose drapery highlight their etherial and feminine nature. The elegant posing of the nymphs was used by Boucher in previous works, particularly of the goddess Diana, such as in Diana at the Bath (1742), to emphasize feminine poise.^[1]

The painting also explores the lushness of idyllic nature. The painting depicts a pool of water, trees behind the figures in the foreground, and hunted birds and rabbits beside the figure of Diana. Other works in the series of four overdoors, including The Exchange of Confidences and Erigone Conquered, are thought to depict nymphs from the Greek Vale of Tempe and Arcadia, placing them in similarly idyllic settings.^[1]

The central figure of this painting is often thought to be Diana, the Roman goddess of the hunt. The leopard skin to her left, her quiver of arrows, and the secondary position of the nymphs to her right all support the identification, as does the presence of the crescent moon in her hair in the print of this work by Duflos. In the painting, the absence of the crescent moon makes her identity more ambiguous.^[1]