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Le Triomphe de Voltaire

A work made of etching on ivory laid paper.
CC0 Public Domain Designation

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  • A work made of etching on ivory laid paper.

Date:

1778/79

Artist:

A. Duplessis
French, 18th century

About this artwork

The French philosopher, playwright, and satirist Voltaire frequently deployed allegories touching on antiquity in his writings In this epic print, Melpomene, Muse of tragedy, leads Voltaire to Apollo to receive the crown of immortality, while his detractors face the fiery pit of hell and Thalia, Muse of comedy, doubles over in laughter. In the background a sculpted bust of Voltaire is wreathed, a ceremony enacted on Paris stages after the writer’s 1778 death. The print was likely made around 1791 to celebrate Voltaire’s re-burial inside the Paris Panthéon, a repurposed church designed after the ancient Roman Pantheon (here described as the Temple of Memory). Voltaire himself owned the original painting of this subject by the same amateur artist who created this print.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Prints and Drawings

Artist

A. Duplessis

Title

Le Triomphe de Voltaire

Place

France (Artist's nationality:)

Date  Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

1773–1784

Medium

Etching on ivory laid paper

Dimensions

Image: 39.8 × 58.8 cm (15 11/16 × 23 3/16 in.); Image with text and vignette: 49.7 × 60.4 cm (19 5/8 × 23 13/16 in.); Plate: 50.8 × 60.9 cm (20 × 24 in.); Sheet: 59.5 × 87.2 cm (23 7/16 × 34 3/8 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of Dorothy Braude Edinburg to the Harry B. and Bessie K. Braude Memorial Collection

Reference Number

2013.528

IIIF Manifest  The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.

https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/148554/manifest.json

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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