1856
ink
From the collection of National Gallery of Art
La tête de Méduse pour l'épicier fautif is a 1856 ink by Honoré Daumier, a Impressionism work, held at National Gallery of Art.
This lithograph shows a shopkeeper holding up Medusa’s severed head to three nervous customers. The customers flinch and cover their faces, while the shopkeeper grins like he’s just sold them spoiled meat. Dark lines make the scene feel mean and funny at once. Daumier often mocked greedy people in his art. This one feels like a quick sketch turned sharp joke about bad business. See how bold black lines make everything pop? That’s lithography.
Honoré-Victorin Daumier was a French painter, sculptor, and printmaker, whose many works offer commentary on the social and political life in France, from the Revolution of 1830 to the fall of the Second French Empire in 1870.
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