Satan Sowing Tare (Satan semant l'ivraie)

Félicien Rops

Associated Names
Félicien Rops

Artist, Belgian, 1833 - 1898

This print depicts a tall, elongated figure walking across a landscape beneath a dark sky. The figure wears a wide-brimmed hat, a loose, flowing garment, and clog-like shoes with pointed, upturned toes. They have long hair and limbs that are exaggeratedly long and thin. We can't see their face. They are facing the right, with one leg in front of the other as if they are mid-step. Their left hand holds a bundle of cloth to their chest, either the flowing train of their garment or some kind of bag. The shapes of small people appear to fall out of this flowing cloth towards the ground below. In their outstretched right hand, they hold two of these small people, holding them over the ground as if about to drop them. The landscape below appears to be a dark cityscape, with some rooftops and towers visible. There is also a pale river with bridges stretching across it. The sky above is shadowy, with a pale moon or sun on the right partially covered by dark clouds.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    aquatint and etching

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    plate: 27.7 x 20.9 cm (10 7/8 x 8 1/4 in.)
    sheet: 37.6 x 26.4 cm (14 13/16 x 10 3/8 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1951.10.401

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Exsteens 1928, no. 783

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Claude Schaefer [1913-2010], Montevideo, Uruguay; sold 1950 to Lessing J. Rosenwald; [1] gift 1950/1951 to the National Gallery of Art.

[1] In Recollections of a Collector, 1976, p. 56-57, Rosenwald described being approached by a young man in South America who offered to sell his father’s collection of prints that he had brought with him from Germany. Rosenwald gives the year as 1951, but his appointment books confirm that it was actually 1950 - he left for Buenos Aires on 9 February 1950 and returned on 20 March 1950 (Library of Congress, Rosenwald Papers, Box 75). Rosenwald writes that he bought the entire collection of some 1100 prints and drawings, but as they had already been scheduled to be sent to Europe they came to the United States via Antwerp, arriving in the US in late April 1950. Rosenwald decided to keep about a quarter of the collection, destined for the National Gallery of Art, and donate the remainder to other institutions. The inventory log of Alverthorpe indicates that just over 300 works were accessioned there in May of 1950, inventory numbers 50.260-50.530, acquired from Claude Schaefer (Gallery Archives, National Gallery of Art, RG 45A1, Rosenwald Papers, Box 41).

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1993

  • Baudelaire's Voyages: The Poet and His Painters, Heckscher Museum, Huntington; Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery, Austin, 1993-1994. 176.

2009

  • The Darker Side of Light: Arts of Privacy, 1850-1900, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; NGA; Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, 2009 - 2010

Bibliography

1928

  • Exsteens, Maurice. L'Oeuvre grave et lithographie de Felicien Rops. 4 vols. and appendix. Paris: Editions Pellet, 1928.

Markings

Recto, stamped in black ink: COMISION NACIONAL DE MUSEOS / Y MONUMENTOS HISTORICOS / JOSE LUIS BUSANICHE / SECRETARIO GENERALE

Wikidata ID

Q65223192

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