Friday, November 10, 2017

Henry Fuseli - Graphic Narratives and Fantasies

Henry Fuseli
Roman Album
Head of a woman
1777
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Woman seated at a table with sheet music
before 1825
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Sleeping woman with flying Cupid
ca. 1780-90
etching
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Roman Album
Head of a woman
1770-78
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Crouching witch coaxing mandrake root out of the earth
(from Ben Jonson's Masque of Queens)
1812
etching
British Museum

Last night, lay all alone
On the ground, to hear the Mandrake groan,
And plucked him up, though he grew full low,
And, as I had done, the Cock did crow.

 Ben Jonson, from The Masque of Queens, celebrated from the House of Fame by the Queen of Great Britain with her Ladies at Whitehall, Feb. 2, 1609

Henry Fuseli
Heavenly Ganymede greeted by young god with Hebe watching
1804
lithograph
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Figure studies
ca. 1795-1800
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
The Captive
1782-83
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Roman Album
Oedipus cursing his son Polynices (Sophocles)
1777-78
drawing
British Museum

"Be off, spat upon by me who am no more your father, villain of villains, taking with you these curses which I call down upon you, so that you shall never conquer in war your native land nor ever return to low-lying Argos, but shall perish by your brother's hand and kill him who drove you out!  Such is my curse, and I call upon the hateful paternal darkness of Tartarus to give you a new home, and I call upon these goddesses, and upon the war god, who injected this grim hatred into your minds!  Now that you have heard this, depart, and go tell all the Cadmeans and your own trusty allies too that such are the prizes which Oedipus has bestowed upon his sons!"

 from Oedipus at Colonus, prose translation (1994) by Hugh Lloyd-Jones

Henry Fuseli
Roman Album
Tiresias and Odysseus (The Odyssey)
1774-78
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Roman Album
Tiresias drinks the blood (The Odyssey)
1774-78
drawing
British Museum

                        At the length did land
Theban Tiresias' soule, and in his hand
Sustaind a golden Scepter, knew me well, 
And said: "O man unhappy, why to hell
Admitst thou darke arrivall and the light
The Sunne gives leav'st, to have the horrid sight
Of this blacke region and the shadows here?
Now sheath thy sharpe sword and the pit forbeare,
That I the blood may taste, and then relate
The truth of those acts that affect thy Fate."

 from book 11 of Homer's Odyssey, translated (1614) by George Chapman

Henry Fuseli
Prometheus rescued by Heracles
before 1825
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Roman Album
Ezzelin, Count of Ravenna, surnamed Bracciaferro (Iron Arm) 
confronting Meduna with her infidelity during his absence in the Holy Land
1772
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Ezzelin, Count of Ravenna, surnamed Bracciaferro (Iron Arm) 
musing over the body of Meduna, slain by him for infidelity during his absence in the Holy Land
1779
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Jason and Medea stealing the Golden Fleece
1806
oil on paper
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Roman Album
Two Men 'smoking' a picture

1774
drawing
British Museum

Henry Fuseli
Scene in the Hospital of S. Spirito in Rome with three monks performing Last Rites on a resisting occupant
1772
drawing
British Museum