1789
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Dominant colour
At Least Be Discreet is a 1789 by Augustin de Saint-Aubin, a Romanticism work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
This print shows a man and woman in a bedroom. The woman is half-dressed. She points up to a blindfolded cupid near a cliff. The man and a cherub hold a rose. Saint-Aubin based it on his own secret affair with his wife. The scene feels playful yet risky, like a private joke turned into art. Look up Augustin de Saint-Aubin (French, 1736–1807).
Together these pendant prints depict a couple saying farewell after a romantic rendezvous. Still partially undressed, the woman cautions her lover to keep their tryst a secret. Both the man and the cherub beneath him proudly display a plucked rose as a symbol of sexual triumph. Meanwhile, below the woman, a blindfolded cupid steps toward a precipice, a sign that this lady is about to fall dangerously in love with a rogue. Amusingly, the prints actually depict the artist and his wife, whimsically portraying the mores and fashion of aristocratic society.
Read the full account in the museum source.
Augustin de Saint-Aubin sometimes styled Auguste de Saint-Aubin (3 January 1736 – 9 November 1807), belongs to an important dynasty of French designers and engravers.
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