# Portrait of a Young Boy [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [GRIMOU, Alexis]() - Date: 1701-1750 - Technique: Oil on canvas, 44 x 35 cm ## Commentary This portrait sketch of a young boy, head and shoulders, with a white collar is typical of Grimou's artistic output. A pupil of Jean-François de Troy, Grimou took from his master a warm palette and added to it an audacity of handling which places him squarely in the 18th century. Often intimate in nature and executed with brushstrokes of a great spontaneity, works like the present clearly provoked the fantasy portraits later <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/f/fragonar/father/1/08abbe.html'\)" href="/html/f/fragonar/father/1/08abbe.html">sketched by Jean-Honoré Fragonard</a> who, moreover, painted pastiches in Grimou's manner. Grimou's influence can also be discerned in the <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/g/greuze/innocenx.html'\)" href="/html/g/greuze/innocenx.html">work of Jean-Baptiste Greuze.</a> Grimou himself sought inspiration from the Dutch Golden Age, with a debt to Rembrandt seen here in the beautifully rendered chiaroscuro. ## Related artworks - [Young Pilgrim Girl]() - [Young Woman in Theatrical Costume]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()