The Mouth of a Brook, No. 1

The Mouth of a Brook, No. 1

Sir Francis Seymour Haden

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Seymour Haden was the unlikely combination of a surgeon and an etcher. Although he pursued a very successful medical career, he is mostly remembered for his etched work as well as for his writings on etching. He was one of a group of artists, including James McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) and Alphonse Legros (1837–1911), whose passionate interest in the medium led to the so-called etching revival, a period that lasted well into the twentieth century. The extolling of etching for its inherent spontaneous qualities reached its pinnacle during this time. While the line of the etching needle, Haden wrote, was "free, expressive, full of vivacity," that of the burin was "cold, constrained, uninteresting," and "without identity. "State I (Da,Ha). A close-up view of a brook with heavily overgrown bank. There is foul-biting in the lower right. With the annotation 'S. Haden 1859' (E, l.l.)." [Source: Schneiderman, p. 93] "Trial proofs: (a) Size as above. 'S. Haden 1859' in left lower corner. Four impressions only had been printed, when, the plate having been laid aside for some time, the larger portion of it became spoiled by oxidation. Colls. Lenox Library, New York; and H.H. Benedict. Exhibited at the Royal Academy, 1861." [Source: Harrington, p. 13]

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Mouth of a Brook, No. 1The Mouth of a Brook, No. 1The Mouth of a Brook, No. 1The Mouth of a Brook, No. 1The Mouth of a Brook, No. 1

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.