Rare Pair of Late 17th Century Louis XIV Hand Colored Theatre Costume Etchings - 13" x 8¾"

An uncommon pair of late 17th-century French hand-colored etchings, delicately printed in etching on laid paper and heightened with watercolor, preserved in petite giltwood frames with beaded and ribbon-twist moldings beneath old glass. Each sheet portrays a full-length theatrical figure in elaborate costume, the lower margins inscribed with French captions. The palette is softly subdued in sepia, stone, pale blue, and umber, the washes lightly animating silks, plumes, and boots. Time has left the sheets with gentle toning, scattered foxing, and slight waviness, while the frames display rubbed gilding, corner wear, and minor losses consistent with age and long display.

Taken from the Recueil des Modes de la Cour de France, published in Paris in the latter seventeenth century, these prints document the fashions and stage costumes of Louis XIV’s court. Issued by Parisian print sellers, the series combined precise etching with engraved detail and was often hand-colored to enliven texture and form. The subjects reflect the Comédie-Italienne and ballet de cour; one names Endymion from the ballet Le Triomphe de l’Amour of 1681 with music by Lully, while the companion depicts a comic player in courtly habit. Circulated widely, such images informed costumiers and spread the taste of the French court throughout Europe.

Graceful in scale and rich in history, the pair lends quiet distinction to a study, music room, or dressing room, their warm tonality and softened gilding harmonizing beautifully with wood, plaster, and textiles. They may hang as a focused duo above a console or integrate within a salon-style arrangement of works on paper, while in a modern interior they bring a refined note of French theatre and seventeenth-century artistry.