Theseus Conqueror of the Centaur Eurytus

Theseus Conqueror of the Centaur Eurytus

Eugène Delacroix

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The figures occur in a metope from the south side of the Parthenon frieze that is now in the British Museum. The lithograph reproduces in reverse a drawing that Delacroix would have made during his stay in London in 1825. On his return from a trip to London in 1825, Delacroix executed this print after a drawing he had made of the Parthenon metope in the British Museum.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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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.