The Prize of a Kiss 1760

Jean-Honoré Fragonard made this oil on canvas, called “The Prize of a Kiss”, in France in the 1780s. It’s an intimate interior, one that speaks to a broader shift in the social role of art at the time. The late 18th century saw the rise of a new kind of bourgeois public in France, one with new expectations for painting. Fragonard and others turned away from the grand public statements of the court and toward private life, sexuality, and family, creating smaller paintings, suitable for domestic display. Note the expressions of surprise, coy amusement, and the rough clothing and staging. These are the visual codes of genre painting. For historians, works like this offer an invaluable window into the domestic lives and social habits of a bygone era. By researching the prints, advertisements, and literature of the period, we can better understand the world in which Fragonard’s paintings were first seen. The meaning of art always depends on its social and institutional context.