In the Park, from "A Love (Opus X)"

In the Park, from "A Love (Opus X)"

Max Klinger

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This large-scale sheet showing an amorous couple is titled Im Park. It is the preliminary drawing for an etching of the same title and scale from the print series Eine Liebe: Opus X (A Love). The series is about a passionate affair that ends in tragedy and is likely based on an episode from Klinger’s own life. In this scene, the couple is locked in a tight embrace, the man tightly holding the woman against his own body as he leans against the trunk of a tree. One can see Klinger's mind at work as he plays with the placement of the leg and foot. Many of the small details differ from the final etching.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In the Park, from "A Love (Opus X)"In the Park, from "A Love (Opus X)"In the Park, from "A Love (Opus X)"In the Park, from "A Love (Opus X)"In the Park, from "A Love (Opus X)"

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.