Agostino Carracci's print Il reciproco Amore has been shown, in an article published recently in this magazine, to have provided the decisive inspiration for Matisse's Bonheur de vivre.  The similarities between the compositions are striking; and the fact that there is very little in Matisse's  preliminary work which seems to prepare his final composition underlines the importance of Carracci's print: it must have come as a sudden revelation, offering a solution to Matisse's problems both in terms of pictorial structure and of content.

On 10th August 1665 Bernini was taken by Chantelou to see the collection of a silk-merchant called Serisier who lived opposite the church of Saint-Merri in the rue Saint-Martin.  He owned a number of paintings by Pousin, including two Phocion landscapes (Earls of Derby and Plymouth), the Esther and Ahasuerus (Hermitage), the Holy Family with ten figures (Dublin), and one described as La Vierge en Egypte.