Provenance: Jacques Langlois (1681–1722), painter and dealer on the Pont Notre Dame, Paris; the inventory following his death on the 16th December 1722, included ‘Le Reve, du sieur Watteau, b.d.[bordure dorée]…120 l. [livres]’. Painting arrived in London, c. 17231; Sir Robert Walpole M.P., 1st Earl of Orford, Prime Minister of England (1676–1745). By 1736, as it is listed in that year in Walpole’s manuscript, A Catalogue of the Right Honourable Sir Robert Walpole’s Collection of Pictures, the painting is listed as hanging in Lady Walpole’s dressing room at 10 Downing Street, and described thus: ‘Watteau – A dream of Watteau’s, Himself asleep by a rock; Several Dancers & Grotesque figures in the Clouds – 2’ 1” – 2’ 7 ¼ ”’ (25 x 31 ¼ in). Sold Cock’s auction room, known as Messrs Cock & Langford, in the Great Piazza of Covent Garden, the Walpole sale, 28 April 1748, second day, lot 62, sold for £ 6.10/-, bought by; James Douglas, 14th Earl of Morton (1702–1768), on whose death, by inheritance to; Susan Elizabeth, Dowager Countess of Morton (1793-1849), widow of the 16th Earl; Sold her sale, Christie’s, 27th April 1850, lot 88, (The Painter’s Dream – a very elegant design), sold for £ 27.6/- to ‘Anthony’. (3rd most expensive painting in sale); James Goding Esq. (d. 1857); his sale, Christie’s, 21st February 1857, lot 503, (The Painter’s Dream- one of eight ‘Watteau’ in the Goding collection), sold for £ 36 to ‘Webb’, bought on behalf of; John Ashley Cooper (1808–1867), 4th son of 6th Earl of Shaftesbury, of 17 Upper Brook Street, Mayfair, London, on whose death, by inheritance to his wife; Julia Ashley, née Conyers (c.1818–1907); Her sale, Christie’s, 25th June 1904, lot 51, sold for £ 68.5/- to; Martin Colnaghi (1821–1908); subsequently sold for FF10,000 to; Renee Gimpel (1881–1945) and Nathan Wildenstein (1851 – 1934), who then sold it for FF150,000 to; David David-Weill (1871–1952), c. 1914, New York; Sold Sotheby’s, 10th June 1959, lot 41, bought for £ 1,200 by ‘Wallraf’ on behalf of Wildenstein & Co., London, thence sold in 1963 through the dealer Dudley Tooth to; Ivo Forde Esq (1949–2023); An English private collector, acquired 1993; Private collection.
