Rococo << roh KOH koh >> is a style of art that flourished in western Europe from about 1700 to 1780. The term comes from a French word for a fanciful rock or shell design. It implies a refined, elegant feeling and style.
Rococo found its fullest expression in France, where the leading representatives were the painters Francois Boucher, Jean Honoré Fragonard, and Antoine Watteau. They worked primarily for royal and aristocratic clients. Their paintings differed greatly in style and subject matter from those of the preceding baroque period. A typical baroque painting was created on a heroic and grand scale, and usually presented Christian religious subjects. Rococo paintings were intimate in scale and delicate in manner. They often portrayed scenes from classical mythology. Rococo artists also created a new category of painting called the fete galante. Their paintings showed gatherings of elegantly dressed figures in parks and gardens.
Outside France, there were other artists during this period who worked in a bright, lively style characteristic of rococo. They included Giovanni Battista Tiepolo in Italy and Thomas Gainsborough in England.
The ornate and decorative style of rococo was also applied to architecture, furniture, porcelain, tapestries, and opera and theater scenery. In architecture, rococo reached its greatest splendor in the palaces, monasteries, and churches of southern Germany and Austria.
