Intérieur d'un Malade (Interior of a Sick Person)
19th century
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Mount: 14 13/16 × 10 5/8 in. (37.6 × 27 cm) Plate: 3 7/8 × 2 15/16 in. (9.8 × 7.5 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
The J. B. Neumann Collection, Gift of Dr. Franz H. Hirschland, 1952
Accession Number
52.508.30
Art Historical Context
Rodolphe Bresdin'sIntérieur d'un Mal (Interior of a Sick Person)*, a 19th-century etching invites viewers into an intimate, poignant scene of vulnerability. Created during a period when printmaking flourished an accessible medium for intricate storytelling, this small-scale work—measuring just 3 7/8 × 2 15/16 inches on the plate—exemplifies the etching technique's power. Bresdin incised his design into a metal plate with acid, allowing for delicate lines and rich tonal depth that capture the quiet drama of illness within a domestic interior. Etchings like this one were prized in the 19th cent...
About the Artist
Rodolphe Bresdin · 1822–1885
Rodolphe Bresdin (1822–1885) was a visionary French draughtsman, engraver, and lithographer whose fantastical imagery captured the empathy of rural poverty and the wild exuberance of the imagination. Born on August 12, 1822, in Montrelais near Le Fresne-sur-Loire in Brittany, he grew up in the Breton countryside amid its bardic folklore traditions before a family dispute left him homeless in Paris...