Raven's Head in Profile
1875
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
About the artist
Artist
Edouard Manet
Édouard Manet didn’t have much time to make his mark—he died at 51—but he used every year.
See the richer artist page1875
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art
Raven's Head in Profile is a 1875 by Edouard Manet, a Impressionism work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.
This lithograph shows a raven’s head in profile, its dark eye staring hard. The bird’s sharp beak and glossy feathers stand out against a pale background. Manet made this for a fancy book version of Poe’s poem “The Raven.” The book was a new art form—pages turned into pictures to match the writing. This isn’t just a bird. It’s the moment the raven says “Nevermore” to the grieving man. See how the light catches the raven’s eye. That trick is called chiaroscuro—the strong contrast between light and dark. Édouard Manet (French, 1832–1883)
Edouard Manet created this lithograph for his friend Stephane Mallarmé’s 1875 French translation of American writer Edgar Allan Poe’s classic poem “The Raven” (1845) about a man mourning his deceased love who is visited by a raven that repeatedly cries, “Nevermore.” Mallarmé’s edition is considered one of the first modern livres d’artistes —books created specifically as works of visual art. Manet created four full-page illustrations, including the scene in which the raven stares at the narrator from the top of the bust of the goddess Athena, and a raven head design used on the book’s cover…
Read the full account in the museum source.
Édouard Manet didn’t have much time to make his mark—he died at 51—but he used every year.
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