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Antique 18th Century Paintings

About this collection

Antique 18th century oil paintings belong to the Rococo age, when the European courts turned from Baroque gravity to lighter colour, intimate scale and elegance.

Powder and lace set the tone. Court and society portraits share the century with biblical, devotional and mythological subjects, and with scenes of everyday life, painted on canvas and on wood panel. Most are framed. Where no signature survives, the attribution stays prudent, after, follower of or attributed to. To see how a portrait of the century was made and dated, read our guide to collecting 18th century French portraits.

-10%Antique portrait of a lady with a pink ribbon hat, 18th century French oil on canvas, gilt frame

French School, 18th century

Lady in a Lace Cap
$4,900$4,400
SoldHagar and Ishmael in the wilderness with the angel, circle of Januarius Zick, 18th century German school oil on canvas, unframed

German School, 18th century

Hagar and Ishmael, 1700sSold
Portrait of a gentleman in a powdered wig, French School oil on canvas, late 18th century, sold unframed

French School, late 18th century

Gentleman in a Powdered Wig
$3,300
The young Saint John the Baptist seated with the lamb and the reed cross, French School oil on canvas

French School, 18th century

Young Saint John, 1700s
$3,600

Guides · before you buy

What a Genre Scene Was Really SayingBefore 1800 the everyday was a vehicle.Read the guideChoosing an Antique Painting for Above the FireplaceThe mantel decides the painting before you do.Read the guide
Dutch School farmyard painting of a hen with her chicks and an earthenware pan, a windmill beyond a ruined wall, oil on canvas in a moulded frame

Dutch School, circa 1700

Hen and Chicks, circa 1700
$6,700
Antique 18th century French portrait of a gentleman with a lace jabot and a pink carnation, oil on canvas in a gilt frame

French School, mid 18th century

Gentleman with a Carnation
$5,800
Two King Charles spaniels in a dark landscape, 18th century French oil on panel in an ebonized frame

French School, 18th century

Two King Charles Spaniels, 1700s
$6,900
A man in a red coat and lace cravat under a long powdered wig, French school, in a carved gilt frame

French School, 18th century

Gentleman in a Red Coat, 1700s
$4,800
 The school Rococo1715 to 1789Watteau's fêtes galantes, the powdered portraits of Nattier and Tocqué.Discover the school
Portrait of a gentleman in a red coat with a white stock and lace jabot, oil on canvas, 18th century French school, unframed

French School, 18th century

Gentleman in a Red Coat, 1700s
$2,800
Antique penitent Magdalene in a cave with an open book and a skull, oil in a moulded gilt frame

Dutch School, early 18th century

Penitent Magdalene, 1700s
$3,800
Pan and Syrinx, the nymph fleeing the god into the reeds, oil on canvas, 18th century European school, in a carved gilt frame

Italian School, 18th century

Pan and Syrinx, 1700s
$2,900
Portrait of a lady in blue-green silk with a pearl necklace, follower of Louis Tocque, 18th century oil on canvas in a gilt frame

French School, 18th century

Lady in Blue-Green Silk, 1700s
$5,700
Christ and the Samaritan woman at the well, French School oil on canvas, 18th century, sold unframed

French School, 18th century

The Samaritan Woman, 1700s
$4,830
A fortune teller takes a young woman's hand while a boy lifts her purse, French genre scene, oil on canvas, 18th century

French School, 18th century

The Fortune Teller, 1700s
$5,785
Antique Dutch School floral still life with a rose, morning glories and a butterfly, oil on canvas in a gilt frame

Dutch School, 18th century

Bouquet with a Butterfly, 1700s
$3,800

GalerieClub Fine Art

1,100+

paintings sold since 2017

Poppy Fields, late 1800sSold Poppy Fields, late 1800s Hagar and Ishmael, 1700sSold Hagar and Ishmael, 1700s Penitent Magdalene, 1600sSold Penitent Magdalene, 1600s

Our promise

  • Every painting photographed front and back
  • The frame you see is the frame that ships
  • Free tracked UPS Express Saver to the US

New paintings, by email

A note when new paintings come in. Nothing else.

Elsewhere in the gallery

18th century paintings for sale at GalerieClub

The 1700s lightened European painting. After the gravity of the Baroque, painters turned to softer colour, gentler light and a more intimate scale, and the courts of France and Central Europe set the taste for elegance. The 18th century oil paintings in this collection come from that century, original 1700s works from several European traditions, many of them unsigned.

  • The face mattered most. Under Louis XV and Louis XVI, sitters posed in silk and velvet, with powdered wigs for the men and lace caps for the women, against dark grounds that let the flesh catch the light. Many of these portraits were painted by followers of the great court portraitists, and the French ones have their own collection of 18th century French portraits.

  • Faith and myth shared the century. Painters told biblical stories in a gentler key, with saints as children and angels come down to the wilderness, and they brought nymphs and satyrs into wooded landscapes. These subjects were painted for private rooms as well as for churches.

  • Everyday life entered the picture. Fortune tellers, farmyards and bouquets of flowers in glass vases gave painters subjects close at hand, treated with the same care as a portrait.

  • Some canvases of the century come without a frame. An unframed 18th century painting is a stretched canvas ready for a frame of the buyer's choosing, and its title always says so. Unsigned works are described by school and period, as our guide to reading an attribution explains.