Scandal, from "Illustrated London News"

Thomas Heaviside

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Abraham Solomon came from a Jewish family whose father's business success enabled three of his children to become artists (the others were Rebecca and Simeon). Made when Abraham was in his twenties, this composition centers on an elderly eighteenth-century couple who amuse themselves with tea and gossip, since no longer able to dance or flirt like the younger figures in the background. The artist became known for images that describe emotional or sentimental encounters within detailed interiors. The satirical element here recalls literary sources such as the novels of Henry Fielding. "Scandal" was shown at the British Institution in 1851 and engraved by Heaviside for the "Illustrated London News."

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