Study of a Young Model

Study of a Young Model

William Henry Hunt

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This full-length figure study is one of several for which Hunt sought a Black person as his model. The sitter was once called a boxer, but his unmarred appearance suggests a less punishing profession, perhaps that of street performer, since we know that the artist befriended Black acrobats and musicians. The drawing may have been intended for study purposes, as Hunt taught well-to-do amateurs, including women who were barred from life-drawing classes at that period. Born with a form of dwarfism, the artist was self-conscious about his appearance and especially appreciative of physical beauty in others. That sensitivity is reflected in his delicate application of watercolors to portray his model’s body with compelling naturalism, heightened by a further contrast with broadly applied strokes used for his wrinkled, pushed-up trousers.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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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.