On Vellum

Jean-Étienne Liotard
The Breakfast
ca. 1752
pastel on vellum
Alte Pinakothek, Munich

Master BF
Illuminated Page from The Romance of Paolo and Daria
by Gaspare Visconti
ca. 1492-99
tempera and ink on vellum
Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Adolph Menzel
Detail of Stonework
1852
watercolor on vellum
Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Will Barnet
Study for Self Portrait and Woman with White Cat
1983
drawing on vellum
Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas

Jean Colombe
David and Goliath
ca. 1475
tempera on vellum
Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris

Christian Rohlfs
Death with Coffin
ca. 1917
woodcut on vellum
Graphische Sammlung, ETH Zürich

Joseph Werner the Younger
Venus in a Landscape
ca. 1690
gouache on vellum
private collection

Thomas Lefebvre
Salome with the Head of John the Baptist
1677
watercolor on vellum
Kupferstichkabinett, Kunstmuseum Basel

Edward Burne-Jones
The King's Wedding
1870
gouache on vellum
Clemens Sels Museum, Neuss, Germany

Francesco Francia (Francesco Raibolini)
Judgment of Paris
ca. 1505-1506
drawing on vellum
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Daniel Nikolaus Chodowiecki
Betrothal Scene
1795
etching on vellum
Graphische Sammlung, ETH Zürich

Caroline Louise, Margravine of Baden-Durlach
Self Portrait
ca. 1745
pastel on vellum
Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe

Jean Perreal
Alchemist consulting Dame Nature
1516
watercolor and gouache on vellum
Musée Marmottan Monet, Paris

Cornelis de Visscher the Younger
Portrait of artist Abraham Bloemaert
(died in 1651 at age 85)
1650
drawing on vellum
Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh

Marco Ricci
Rocky Landscape with Penitents
ca. 1725-30
gouache on vellum
Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin

Jean-Étienne Liotard
Frankish Woman and her Servant
ca. 1738-42
pastel on vellum
Musée d'Art et d'Histoire de Genève

[The Pythia leaves, by the side from which she had originally entered. The ekkyklema is then rolled out of the main door. On it is Orestes in a suppliant posture at the navel-stone, still with his sword and wreathed olive-branch, and facing him three Furies slumped in sleep on chairs.]
 

Orestes:  Lord Apollo, you know how to avoid doing wrong.  Since you understand that, learn also how not to be uncaring.  Your power is amply sufficient to help me.

[Apollo appears out of the darkness, at the rear of the ekkyklema platform.] 

Apollo:  I will not betray you: I will be your guardian to the end, whether standing close to you or a long way off, and I will not be soft towards your enemies.  Even now you see these madwomen taken captive: fallen in sleep, these abominable old maidens, these aged virgins, with whom no god ever holds any intercourse, nor man nor beast either – why, they were absolutely born for evil, for they dwell in the evil darkness, in Tartarus beneath the earth, and are hateful to men and to the Olympian gods.  Nevertheless, you must flee, and not weaken; for they will drive you right through the length of the mainland, as you go ever forward over the land you tread in your wanderings, and over the water to sea-girt cities.  And do not let these labours weigh on your mind to give up the struggle, until you come to the city of Pallas and sit clasping her ancient image* in your arms.  There we will have judges to judge these matters, and words that will charm, and we will find means to release you from this misery for good and all – for it was I who induced you to kill the woman who was your mother.  Remember, do not let terror conquer your mind.  And you, my own blood brother, begotten of the same father, Hermes, guard him, and, true to your title, be his escort, shepherding this my suppliant – for Zeus respects the sanctity of wayfarers like this one – who will have the blessing of a good escort as he starts his journey back to human society.

– Aeschylus, from Eumenides (458 BC), translated by Alan H. Sommerstein (2008)

*The olive-wood cult image of Athena Polias in her temple on the Acropolis.