Art Institute of Chicago

A Woman Sitting by the Window (“Evening Thou Bringest All”), from the first issue of Specimens of Polyautography

Henry Fuseli (Swiss, active in England, 1741-1825)

Date

1802, published 1803

Medium

Lithograph in black on cream wove paper, tipped onto mount with aquatint border in gray on cream wove paper

Culture

United Kingdom

Department

Prints and Drawings

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

Specimens of Polyautography (published 1803), the portfolio of lithographs that included Fuseli’s print (as well as James Barry’s Eastern Patriarch and Benjamin West’s Angel of the Resurrection ), contained the first lithographs published in Britain. Lithography is a form of printing in which a drawing is made directly on limestone, which is then moistened and inked, the ink adhering only to the drawn marks. The resulting print thus retains the immediacy of the original drawing. The Greek inscription on Fuseli’s print, a quote from the ancient Greek lyric poet Sappho which was reversed in the printing process, means “Evening, thou bringest all [things home].”

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