"The Duchess is singing a nocturne with the Duke..." from Scenes from the Private and Public Life of Animals

Q: When was ""The Duchess is singing a nocturne with the Duke..." from Scenes from the Private and Public Life of Animals" created?

This artwork was created ca. 1837–47.

Q: Is ""The Duchess is singing a nocturne with the Duke..." from Scenes from the Private and Public Life of Animals" in the public domain?

Yes, "The Duchess is singing a nocturne with the Duke..." from Scenes from the Private and Public Life of Animals is in the public domain and available for free download under CC0 license.

Louis-Henri Brevière|Honoré de Balzac|J. J. Grandville

ca. 1837–47

"The Duchess is singing a nocturne with the Duke..." from Scenes from the Private and Public Life of Animals by Louis-Henri Brevière|Honoré de Balzac|J. J. Grandville

Medium

Wood engraving

Dimensions

Sheet: 10 3/8 × 7 3/16 in. (26.3 × 18.3 cm)

Classification

Prints

Department

Drawings and Prints

Museum

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY

Credit

The Elisha Whittelsey Collection. The Elisha Whittelsey Fund, 1959

Accession Number

59.500.592(63)

Art Historical Context

Step into the whimsical world of 19th-century French satire with "The Duchess is singing ae with the Duke..." *Scenes from the Private Public Life of Animals*. around 1837–47, this wood engraving from a collaborative masterpiece by writer Honoré de Balzac renowned for his *Human Comedy* novels, illustrator J.J. Grandville, a master of anthropomorphic fantasy, and engraver Louis-Henrivière. The series playfully skewers high society by dressing animals in human roles, here imagining aristocratic pets performing a romantic nocturne—a nod to Chopin's poetic piano pieces—highlighting the absurd van...

About the Artist

|French, Forges-les-Eaux 1797–1869 Hyers

"The Duchess is singing a nocturne with the Duke..." from Scenes from the Private and Public Life of Animals

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