The Archangel Raphael (Study for a stained-glass window in the chapel of Notre-Dame de la Compassion-Saint-Ferdinand, Neuilly)
ca. 1842
Medium
Graphite
Dimensions
15 3/16 x 5 7/8 in. (38.5 x 14.9 cm)
Classification
Drawings
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Bequest of Alexandrine Sinsheimer, 1958
Accession Number
59.23.54
Tags
About this artwork
This preparatory drawing presents the Archangel Raphael in an elongated, vertical composition designed for a stained-glass window. Ingres renders the archangel with graceful linearity, capturing the figure's ethereal presence through delicate contours and subtle modeling. The drawing demonstrates Ingres's characteristic emphasis on pure line as the foundation of artistic expression, with graphite used to define form through precise draughtsmanship rather than dramatic tonal contrasts. The archan...
About the Artist
Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres · 1780–1867
Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres was born on 29 August 1780 in Montauban, in the Tarn-et-Garonne region of southern France, into a family with deep artistic and musical connections — his father was a painter, sculptor, and musician. He showed exceptional promise from childhood, enrolling at the Académie Royale in Toulouse where he studied under the sculptor Jean-Pierre Vigan, the landscape painter Je...