1842
ink
From the collection of National Gallery of Art
Dominant colour
Les Nuits de Pénélope is a 1842 ink by Honoré Daumier, a Romanticism work, held at National Gallery of Art.
This drawing shows a woman sitting alone in a dim room. She’s wrapped in a loose cloth, her head tilted back like she’s lost in thought. A basket of fruit sits near her feet, and a loom with half-finished cloth hangs in the background. Above her, a strange, shadowy figure floats near a window. The text below hints this scene comes from an old story—Penelope, waiting for her husband. The loom suggests she’s weaving, then undoing her work to stall time. Next, look up lithography to see how this print was made.
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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