The tragic actor: Rouvière in the role of Hamlet

Manet, Edouard (1832-1883)


Item type:
print
Date of creation:
1865-1866
Technique / Medium:
etching

    Item location

  • Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)
    [Museum inv. no.: 21.76.21]on blue laid paper, final state (II), from 1905 Strölin edition. plate: 14 3/8 x 8 9/16in. (36.5 x 21.7cm);
    sheet: 17 3/4 x 11 5/8in. (45.1 x 29.5cm)

Description

From the Metropolitan Museum of Art website: Manet here presents the celebrated French tragedian Philibert Rouvière as Hamlet, feathered hat in hand and sword at his feet, confronting the viewer against a shadowed background of scribbled lines. His distant, mournful expression, suitable for Shakespeare's tragic hero, may also convey the artist's feelings at the actor's recent death. Manet derived the powerful composition from his related oil painting (RIdIM item 4060, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.), a work that recalls Velasquez's portrait of the seventeenth-century actor Pablo de Valladolid (Museo del Prado, Madrid).

People as subjects

Rouvière, Philibert Alphonse (1809-1865)

Iconclass

48C8312
portrait of actor
83(SHAKESPEARE, Hamlet)
(scenes from) specific works of literature: Shakespeare, Hamlet

RIdIM images


Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)

Image URLs

image link 1
Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)

RIdIM record id

4053