Colbert Visiting the Gobelins

Sébastien Leclerc I

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This etching illustrates a visit to the Gobelins workshops by Colbert de Villacerf, Surintendant des Bâtiments du Roi from 1691 to 1699. The workers are in the process of hanging one of a set of tapestries depicting the Story of Alexander, woven for Louis XIV after designs by Charles Le Brun.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art