Two Studies of a Seated Arab with a Pipe

Two Studies of a Seated Arab with a Pipe

Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Decamps—a prosperous painter, draftsman, and printmaker—was one of the first major European artists to travel extensively in the Near East. As he toured throughout North Africa and Asia Minor in 1828, he developed an interest in Orientalist themes. In this drawing, he used chalks and charcoal to draw two bold studies of the same seated Arab man with a pipe. The figures’ stillness and variation in scale encourage the viewer to imagine the artist’s voyage and his experience as he approaches or distances himself from the weary man.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Two Studies of a Seated Arab with a PipeTwo Studies of a Seated Arab with a PipeTwo Studies of a Seated Arab with a PipeTwo Studies of a Seated Arab with a PipeTwo Studies of a Seated Arab with a Pipe

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.