Two Laughing Children

Children’s portraits play an important part in Tkadlík’s oeuvre. During the last third of the 18th century significant changes took place not only in the genre of children’s portraiture, but even in the overall view of the role the child played in society. It was specifically during this period that childhood was defined as the „age of innocence“, and, for the first time, society started to consider children as sensitive, vulnerable beings, who embody spontaneity and an unspoilt nature. Elements of this new approach to children, which Jean-Jacques Rousseau summarised in his Émile (1762), were also reflected in the visual arts - allegorising meanings gave way to depicting children in natural situations, with childish attributes, and interest shifted from typological depiction to true portraits.