The Art Connoisseurs

The Art Connoisseurs

Louis Léopold Boilly

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

With great intensity, brows furrowed and mouths open, a tightly knit cluster of grotesque characters peering through monocles and glasses examines a small painting. Boilly's print from his satirical series "Recueil des grimaces" pokes fun at amateur art connoisseurs. The artist made many studies of facial expressions, which culminated in these biting caricatures of contemporary society.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Art ConnoisseursThe Art ConnoisseursThe Art ConnoisseursThe Art ConnoisseursThe Art Connoisseurs

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.