The Trumpet and the Bassoon

Thomas Rowlandson

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This is one of two prints that Rowlandson devoted to a snoring couple, using the title to suggest that the man projects a lower sound and the woman a higher. This 1803 version, published by William Holland, centers on the two sleepers snuggled together. In 1811 Rowlandson adapted the idea for Thomas Tegg and expanded the view to include the bedroom (see 17.3.888-11, 59.533.1398, and 59.533..2017; for other impressions of this image see 59.533.2018).

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