Design for the painted decoration of a ceiling in with strapwork and rinceaux
Medium
pen and ink and watercolor, heightened with white gouache on wove paper; mounted on blue wove paper
Dimensions
Overall: 14 13/16 x 10 3/8 in. (37.6 x 26.3 cm) image: 6 15/16 x 6 15/16 in. (17.6 x 17.7 cm)
Classification
Drawings
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Dodge Fund, 1967
Accession Number
67.827.235
Rights
Public Domain
Tags
Art Historical Context
This delicate preparatory drawing, titled *Design for the Painted Decoration of a Ceiling with Strapwork and Rinceaux*, was created by French artists Jules-EdmondCharles Lachaise andène-Pierre Gourdet during the mid-to-late 19th (1830–97).ed in pen and ink with watercolor, heightened with white gouache onove paper and mounted on blue wove paper, it measures about 15 x 10 inches overall. Housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Drawings and Prints department (acquired via the Dodge Fund in 1967), it exemplifies the meticulous planning behind grand interior decorations of the era. Strapwork—intricate motifs mimicking intertwined leather straps—and rinceaux, flowing scrolls of foliage, were revived ornamental styles blending Renaissance and Baroque influences with 19th-century eclecticism. These elements filled opulent ceilings in Parisian hôtels particuliers and public spaces, reflecting France's post-Napoleonic taste for lavish historicism amid the Industrial Age. The artists' precise pen lines define bold architectural frames, while soft watercolors and gouache highlights add luminosity, simulating the final painted effect. As a collaborative design sketch, it offers a window into the architect-artist workshops of Second Empire France, where such drawings bridged imagination and execution. Visitors can appreciate how these humble sheets on paper orchestrated breathtaking overhead spectacles, blending technical virtuosity with timeless decorative flair.
About the Artist
Jules-Edmond-Charles Lachaise|Eugène-Pierre Gourdet · 1897–1897
Jules-Edmond-Charles Lachaise, born Jules Lachaise on September 2, 1836, in Paris, emerged as a prominent French painter and draughtsman specializing in lavish interior decorations during the Second Empire and beyond. Little is known about his early life and formal training, though he married Berthe Gourdet in 1866, forging a close professional partnership with her brother, the decorator Eugène-Pi...