François Boucher was the son of a designer of lace. Recognizing the artistic potential in his son, Boucher was sent to study with the painter François Le Moyne but was most influenced by the delicate style of his contemporary Antoine Watteau.

He studied in Rome from 1727 to 1731 and in 1723 won the Prix de Rome.

After his return to France, he created hundreds of paintings, decorative boudoir panels, tapestry designs, theater designs, and book illustrations. He became a faculty member of the Royal Academy in 1734. He designed for the Beauvais tapestry works and in 1755 became director of the Gobelins tapestries.

In 1765 he was made first painter to the king, director of the Royal Academy, and designer for the Royal Porcelain Works. His success was encouraged by his patron, Marquise de Pompadour, mistress to Louis XV, whose portrait he painted several times.

Boucher's delicate, lighthearted depictions of classical divinities and well-dressed French shepherdesses delighted the public, who considered him the most fashionable painter of his day.

François Boucher was also noted for his pastoral and mythological scenes, whose work embodies the frivolity and sensuousness of the Rococo style.

Boucher's sentimental, facile style was too widely imitated and fell out of favor during the rise of Neoclassicism but he never lost the interest of his many students, many of which became famous in their own right, including Jacques-Louis David, François-Hubert Drouais, and Jean-Honoré Fragonard.