La Lac au Milieu de la Forêt (The Lake in the Middle of the Forest)
1849
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Sheet: 5 3/8 × 6 7/16 in. (13.6 × 16.3 cm) Plate: 1 11/16 × 3 1/16 in. (4.3 × 7.8 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, 1950
Accession Number
50.575.58
Art Historical Context
Nestled within the intricate world of 19th-century French printmaking *La Lac au Milieu de la Forêt* (The Lake in the Middle the Forest) is a etching by Rodolphedin, created in 1849. Measuring just 5 3/8 × 6 7/16 inches on the sheet, with an even smaller plate of 1 11/16 × 3 1/16 inches, this intimate work invites viewers into a hushed, enchanting landscape. Bresdin, a visionary artist often overlooked in his time, crafted scenes blending Romantic reverie with meticulous detail, evoking the sublime mystery of nature. Etching, Bresdin's favored medium, allowed him to achieve extraordinary prec...
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...