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| Paul-César Helleu Portrait of Alice Helleu, the Artist's Wife 1895 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Victor-François-Eloi Biennourry Study of Roman Soldier (for mural) ca. 1851-52 pastel Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| Pierre Puvis de Chavannes Man reclining on steps, reading (study for Boston Public Library mural) ca. 1895 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Odilon Redon Human Plant ca. 1880 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
Effet de nuit
La nuit. La pluie. Un ciel blafard que déchiquette
De flèches et de tours à jour la silhouette
D'une ville gothique éteinte au lointain gris.
La plaine. Un gibet plein de pendus rabougris
Secoués par le bec avide des corneilles
Et dansant dans l'air noir des gigues non-pareilles,
Tandis que leurs pieds sont la pâture des loups.
Quelques buissons d'épine épars, et quelques houx
Dressant l'horreur de leur feuillage à droite, à gauche,
Sur le fuligineux fouillis d'un fond d'ébauche.
Et puis, autour de trois livides prisonniers
Qui vont pieds nus, deux cent vingt-cinq pertuisaniers
En marche, et leurs fers droits, comme des fer de herse,
Luisent à contresens des lances de l'averse.
– Paul Verlaine, from Poèmes saturniens (1866)
Night Effect
Night. Rain. A livid sky pierces the lacework
Of spires and towers, the silhouette of a Gothic
Town dim in the gray distance.
The plain. A gibbet full of corpses, shrivelled ones
Shaken by the crows' avid beaks,
In the black air dancing incomparable gigues
While their feet are the provender of wolves.
Some thin thorn bushes and some holly leaves
To the right and left extend the horror of their foliage
Against a background like a sooty jumbled sketch.
And then, surrounding three pale prisoners
Walking barefoot, two hundred twenty-five halberdiers,
Their shining upright weapons at cross-purposes
With the lances of the rain, like the spikes of a portcullis.
– translation by Karl Kirchwey, from Poems Under Saturn (2011)
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| Édouard Manet Portrait of Alphonse Maureau 1878-79 pastel on canvas Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Henri Fantin-Latour The Anniversary (Homage to Hector Berlioz) 1877 pastel over lithograph Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Edgar Degas Landscape with Smokestacks ca. 1890 pastel over monotype Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Théodore Rousseau In the Forest of Fontainebleau ca. 1850 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Joseph-Ferdinand Lancrenon Drapery Study for Castor and Pollux freeing Helen 1817 drawing Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| Édouard Manet Study of a Seated Nude (La Toilette) ca. 1858-60 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Édouard Manet Young Man standing (Léon Leenhoff) ca. 1864-65 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Edgar Degas Italian Head ca. 1856 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Edgar Degas Académie 1858 drawing Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Odilon Redon The Beacon 1883, reworked ca. 1893 pastel Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Carle Vernet Death of Hippolytus 1800 drawing Getty Museum, Los Angeles |