Incendie
18th century
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Sheet (trimmed): 4 5/8 × 5 3/8 in. (11.7 × 13.7 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1953
Accession Number
53.600.4367
Art Historical Context
"Incendie" (Fire), an 18th-century etching French artist Quentin Pierre Chedel, captures the intensity of its titular subject through the intricate lines of printmaking. Created during a period when etchings were prized for their expressive freedom—allowing artists to draw directly on metal plates with acid-resistant grounds before the corrosive bite created rich, tonal effects—this small-scale work (4 5/8 × 5 3/8 in.) exemplifies the technical virtuosity of the era. Chedel's piece likely evokes the chaos and spectacle of a blaze, a motif popular in European art for symbolizing destruction, pa...