St. Eustache, Paris

David Cox

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Cox painted this important late Gothic church during his first visit to Paris in the summer of 1829. After spraining his ankle, the artist hired a cab to sketch from, stationing himself here on the corner of Rue Trainée and Rue du Four—buildings shown lining the street at right no longer exist. The church had been ransacked during the French Revolution and its west entrance facade remains pockmarked by artillery. Cox shows figures emerging from the open door, seated on the steps, and moving down the street. Swiftly applied swags of watercolor at lower right indicate drapery hanging below shop signs. Visually, the image offers a delightful interplay between architectural structure, warm late afternoon light, and city life.

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