Les Pecheurs napolitains 1765

Anne Philiberte Coulet created this print, "Les Pecheurs napolitains", after a painting by Joseph Vernet. The print invites us to consider the romanticized visions of labor and leisure that were popular in 18th-century Europe. The scene depicts Neapolitan fishermen in what appears to be a moment of repose. The figures are idealized, embodying a kind of rustic innocence, yet this image simplifies the harsh realities of working-class life. It was a period marked by significant social stratification, where the lives of the aristocracy differed sharply from those of the working class. Representations like these often served to reinforce existing power structures, masking social inequalities behind a veneer of pastoral beauty. How do we reconcile the aesthetic pleasure of the artwork with its potential to obscure the lived realities of the people it depicts? Does art have a responsibility to portray social realities accurately, or is its primary function to provide an escape from them?