The Fall of Icarus

The Fall of Icarus

John Doyle

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Lord Chancellor Brougham is here cast as Icarus falling through the air after flying too close to the sun (the sun in this image contains the face of William IV). His collapsing wings are lettered "Edinburgh Review," "Society of useful knowledge," "Penny Encyclopædia," "Morning Chronicle," and "Globe," all journals to which the Chancellor contributed articles to praised the king (and by extension himself). The image suggests that recent speeches given during a provicinal tour implied too great a degree of familiarity with the monarch, whose hot response is here to melt the wax of his minister's great seal, causing him to fall from office.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Fall of IcarusThe Fall of IcarusThe Fall of IcarusThe Fall of IcarusThe Fall of Icarus

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.