Fingal Mourning Over the Body of Malvina, from Ossian's Berrathon
Medium
Black chalk with brush and black ink and brown wash, heightened with white gouache, on ivory laid paper prepared with a gray wash
Dimensions
18.4 × 25.7 cm (7 1/4 × 10 1/8 in.)
Classification
chalk
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
188965
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
The dazzling, otherworldly, glow-in-the-dark effect Girodet achieved in this drawing is a testament to his extraordinary skill as a draftsman and painter, and to his all-consuming desire to be original. Girodet illustrates a scene from a poem purportedly written by the ancient Scottish bard, Ossian, whose work was “discovered” and published in the 1760s. A famous literary hoax, the poems took Europe by storm. Here, Ossian’s father Fingal stands before the body of the dead Malvina, while her spi...