Tiger Ready to Spring
n.d.
Medium
Cliché verre on cream wove paper
Dimensions
Image: 15.8 × 19.1 cm (6 1/4 × 7 9/16 in.); Plate: 16.7 × 20.1 cm (6 5/8 × 7 15/16 in.); Sheet: 17 × 20.5 cm (6 3/4 × 8 1/8 in.)
Classification
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
92343
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
In contrast to the many resting tigers depicted by Delacroix in paintings, lithographs, and etchings, this one stands upright on its feet, tense and snarling at a challenger to the left. This is a rare instance of the artist’s use of the cliché verre technique, in which lines were etched or drawn on a glass plate to make a photographically produced image. Here the sparely delineated strokes imbue the wiry cat with an almost electric sense of anticipation and compact power.
About the Artist
Eugène Delacroix · 1798–1863
Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) stands as the defining figure of French Romanticism and a pivotal bridge to modernism. Born in Charenton-Saint-Maurice near Paris, he came from distinguished lineage—his mother descended from the prestigious Oeben-Riesener furniture dynasty, while persistent speculation suggested the statesman Talleyrand may have been his biological father, a theory supported by physic...