Saint en Prière (Saint in Prayer)
1839
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Mount: 11 7/8 × 8 11/16 in. (30.2 × 22 cm) Sheet: 1 7/8 × 1 7/8 in. (4.8 × 4.8 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
The J. B. Neumann Collection, Gift of Dr. Franz H. Hirschland, 1952
Accession Number
52.508.35
Tags
Art Historical Context
In the tranquil galleries of the Metropolitan Museum of's Drawings and Prints department Rodolphe Bresdin'sSaint en Prière*1839) invites quiet contemplation. This intimate etching depicts a solitary saint immersed in prayer, embodying themes of devotion and spirituality central to 19th-century religious imagery. Bresdin, a French artist active during the Romantic era, crafted this work early in his career, when printmaking flourished as a democratic medium for sharing profound visions with wider audiences. Etching's allure lies in its tactile process: acid bites into a metal plate along incis...
About the Artist
Rodolphe Bresdin · 1822–1885
Rodolphe Bresdin (1822–1885) was a visionary French draughtsman, engraver, and lithographer whose fantastical imagery captured the empathy of rural poverty and the wild exuberance of the imagination. Born on August 12, 1822, in Montrelais near Le Fresne-sur-Loire in Brittany, he grew up in the Breton countryside amid its bardic folklore traditions before a family dispute left him homeless in Paris...