The Animal Creation

The Animal Creation

Currier & Ives

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Wild and domesticate animals from the four continents gather here peacefally near a watering hole. In the foreground an elephant and a giraffe at right, and a leopard and a stag at left flank a lion with a sheep resting its foreleg across the lion's paw. Behind at right are a hyena and a donkey, then a zebra, moose, horse, antelope, fox and camels. At left we also find an armidillo, wolf, kangaroo and American buffalo, then a tiger, boar, bear, tapir and monkeys. In the center before the lake are a mouse, goat and rabbits. Beyond the lake are a crocodile, water buffalo and warthog, and various kinds of birds, including a peacock, ostrich, turkey and eagle. Animals from all parts of the earth are included in this scene which echoes Isaiah 11.6, a prophetic vision of a messianic time of peace when: "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together." Artistic responses to this verse traditionally pair a lion with a lamb.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Animal CreationThe Animal CreationThe Animal CreationThe Animal CreationThe Animal Creation

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.