Prayer (upper); Cart in Front of a House (lower)
1845
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Image (Upper): 2 9/16 × 3 15/16 in. (6.5 × 10 cm) Image (Lower): 1 15/16 × 2 1/16 in. (5 × 5.3 cm) Sheet: 12 in. × 8 1/16 in. (30.5 × 20.5 cm) Plate: 7 1/16 × 5 1/2 in. (18 × 14 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of Howard Mansfield, 1931
Accession Number
31.20.26
Art Historical Context
Charles Jacque’s 1845 etching presents two modest yet evocative rural scenes on a single plate. The upper image, titled “Prayer,” and the lower scene, “Cart in Front of a House,” capture quiet moments of 19th-century French country life. Measuring just a few inches across, these small compositions reward close viewing, inviting visitors to appreciate the intimate scale typical of works on paper. Etching, the medium Jacque employed here, allowed artists to create fine, expressive lines and delicate tonal effects through the controlled use of acid on metal plates. The crisp details in both vign...
About the Artist
Charles Jacque
Charles-Émile Jacque (1813–1894) was a pioneering French painter, engraver, and illustrator whose career bridged the worlds of printmaking and pastoral painting. Born in Paris amid a difficult childhood, he apprenticed at age seventeen to a map engraver, mastering drypoint technique and producing his first etching in 1830—a copy of a head after Rembrandt. After serving seven years in the French Ar...