Portrait of a man dressed in furs

Portrait of a man dressed in furs

Thomas Worlidge

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

A portraitist and etcher known for working in the style of Rembrandt, Worlidge was also a skilled draftsman. This subject appears "in character," wearing 17th-century costume and adopting a genial expression and informal pose that a possible friendship with the artist. Small portraits made by delicately applying graphite to vellum were a type perfected in Holland that later became popular in England after William III (William of Orange), assumed the British throne in 1688.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Portrait of a man dressed in fursPortrait of a man dressed in fursPortrait of a man dressed in fursPortrait of a man dressed in fursPortrait of a man dressed in furs

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.