Head Study for "The Entombment of Christ"

Head Study for "The Entombment of Christ"

Henri Regnault

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Regnault produced this drawing as part of his process to prepare an ambitious work for the Salon of 1865, "The Entombment of Christ." Ultimately, he chose not to exhibit the work and it remained unfinished in his studio in Sèvres, where it was destroyed during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870. Regnault died serving as a foot soldier in that same conflict. His father, a self-taught scientist and pioneering photographer, dedicated this drawing to the wife of his friend and scientific collaborator, Jules de Reiset, who cared for him following a stroke in 1873. As a study for the head of the dead Christ, it was a poignant gift from a father grieving the death of his son.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Head Study for "The Entombment of Christ"Head Study for "The Entombment of Christ"Head Study for "The Entombment of Christ"Head Study for "The Entombment of Christ"Head Study for "The Entombment of Christ"

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.