Le Ris (from Caractères des passions, gravés sur les desseins de l'illustre Monsieur le Brun)
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Sheet: 2 15/16 × 5 13/16 in. (7.5 × 14.8 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1953
Accession Number
53.600.2897
Tags
Art Historical Context
**Le Ris (Laughter)**, an exquisite etching from the series *Caractères des passions (Characters of the Passions), captures the raw intensity of human emotion through a man's contorted, joyous face. Created by engraver Sébastien Le Clerc Younger after designs by the illustrious Charles Le Brun between 1695 and 1720, this petite print (just under 3 by 6 inches) exemplifies the era's fascination with facial expressions windows to the soul. Le Brun, Louis XIV's premier painter and head of the Royal Academy, drew from Renaissance theories of physiognomy to systematically depict passions like laugh...
About the Artist
Sébastien Le Clerc, le Jeune|Charles Le Brun (French|French) · 1676 |1619 –1763 |1690
French, Paris 1676–1763 Gobelins|French, Paris 1619–1690 Paris