The Artillery Caisson
Medium
Lithograph in black on ivory wove paper
Dimensions
Image: 41.5 × 52.4 cm (16 3/8 × 20 11/16 in.); Sheet: 42 × 53.7 cm (16 9/16 × 21 3/16 in.)
Classification
lithograph
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
14456
Art Historical Context
**The Artillery Caisson** (1818) is a striking lithograph by Théodoreéricault, the French Romantic artist renowned for his dramatic depictions of human struggle and equine power. Created when Géricault was just 27, this work captures a moment of military might: a caisson—a two-wheeled cart carrying artillery ammunition—pulled by powerful horses amid a team of soldiers. Printed in bold black ink on ivory wove paper (image: 41.5 × 52.4 cm), it exemplifies the raw energy of Romanticism, with Géricault's masterful rendering of motion and tension foreshadowing his masterpiece, *The Raft of the Medu...
About the Artist
Jean Louis André Théodore Géricault · 1791–1824
Jean-Louis André Théodore Géricault (1791–1824) was born into a prosperous bourgeois family in Rouen, France, the son of a lawyer who managed the family tobacco business. After moving to Paris around 1797, his artistic talent emerged early, nurtured in a circle that included his maternal uncle Jean-Baptiste Caruel and art dealer Jean-Louis Laneuville. Géricault began formal training in 1808 under ...