Cottagers, with Fireside

Henri Merke

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In the 18th and 19th centuries, magic lanterns entertained viewers by projecting images onto a wall or screen (these box-like devices used a mirror to intensify light and direct it through a tranparent image and lens). The London publisher Rudolph Ackermann produced specially treated prints for use in magic lanterns and this example represents the first stage of such an image. Etched lines, based on a drawing by Rowlandson, have established the design. Next tone would have be added to the printing plate and the resulting images hand-colored and oiled. A finished colored example is in the British Museum.

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