Breaking Up of the Blue Stocking Club

Breaking Up of the Blue Stocking Club

Thomas Rowlandson

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Five pairs of women brawl over a tea table at center. Teacups have fallen to the floor and broken while the women are in combat. Three cats add to the uproar.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Breaking Up of the Blue Stocking ClubBreaking Up of the Blue Stocking ClubBreaking Up of the Blue Stocking ClubBreaking Up of the Blue Stocking ClubBreaking Up of the Blue Stocking Club

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.