WORKS by the acclaimed 18th Century artist Francois Boucher will go on display in the region next week.

The Bowes Museum, in Barnard Castle, County Durham, is hosting the exhibition from January 22 until March 27. It will feature a number of paintings by the artist who was court painter to French King Louis XV.

One of the main exhibits is a landscape by Boucher (1707-1770), one of only four landscapes by him in public collections in the British Isles, that depicts an imaginary scene of women washing clothes by a watermill.

He was the favourite painter of King Louis's mistress Madame de Pompadour and he painted numerous pictures of nymphs, cupids and shepherds.

Boucher was also a master of artificial landscape showing everyday folk in idyllic rural surroundings.

The exhibition also features works by his contemporaries Hubert Robert, Jean-Baptiste Pillement, Charles-Joseph Natoire and Jean-Honore Fragonard.

Howard Coutts, curator at the museum, said: "We are thrilled to have this important exhibition of French landscape at the Bowes museum.

"It illustrates their debt to Dutch and Italian sources, and is a rare chance to see works by these major French 18th Century painters together."

For more information, call (01833) 690606.

Admission is £6 for adults, £5 concessions and children under 16 are free.