Antoine Watteau is best known as the creator of the fête galante genre, a style that has its roots in 17th-century Dutch and Flemish scenes of jollity, but which is characterized by a more nuanced language of gesture and emotion, while elegantly dressed figures and in costume they engage in gentle courtships and love games in a garden. Here the central focus of the composition is on a couple dancing a minuet, the groups on either side appearing to pay them no attention, as they engage in numerous conversations and playful exchanges, the multiplicity of which attests to Watteau's consummate ability to weave complex psychological interactions with a simple look or a gesture of the head. Les Plaisirs du Bal exemplifies the delicacy of touch for which Watteau is celebrated - visible here in the sheen of the fabrics and the airy, weightless landscape seen beyond the loggia - a fluidity that ultimately derives from the open brushwork and broken color of Rubens and 16th century 19th century Venetian painting. The figure of the black boy wearing a turban watching the festivities from the balcony and the page serving wine to the lady on the right are directly based on Veronese's work: the servant is a direct quote from Veronese 's Christ and the Centurion. On the left, among the crowd, we can glimpse the figures of Harlequin, Pierrot and Mezzetin, standard figures of the Comedia dell'arte, which highlight the theatrical character of the fête galante and its precarious balance between masquerade and reality. The artist's fine, rapid brushstrokes are perfectly captured in the caryatids (sculpted female figures used as columns) that support the right-hand niche, whose softness challenges the stone in which they are carved, enhancing the dreamlike quality of the painting.