Fancy pictures

Fancies was a term coined in 1737 by the art critic and historian George Vertue to describe genre scenes that also incorporated invented or imagined elements, or a storyline. He invented in to describe the paintings of Philip Mercier, such as Venetian Girl at a Window or the series The Five Senses. The extended term for the same subgenre, fancy pictures was invented by Joshua Reynolds to describe paintings with beggar or peasant children produced by Thomas Gainsborough in his final decades.