Open IIIF manifest What is IIIF IIIF viewers

Studies of eight grotesque masks

Maker

(artist)
1700-1799

Title

Date of Production

(circa) 1700

Medium

red chalk on laid paper

Dimensions

Height: 15.7 cm
Width: 19.3 cm

Accession Number

D.1984.AB.124

Mode of Acquisition

Anthony Blunt, Art Fund bequest & grant aid, 1984

Credit

The Courtauld, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)

Copyright

Work in the public domain

Location

Not currently on display

Keywords

Label Text

The eight mascarons on this sheet offer different treatments of an ornamental motif that, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, served to decorate the keystones of windows and doors. Some, notably the female heads, are quite naturalistically rendered; others are stylised, the heads not fully human but hybrid, sporting satyr’s ears and ram’s horns. Mouths that gape grotesquely, tongues that stick out and curl, exhibit ornament’s potential to transgress and offend. Some 18th-century architectural theorists objected to the use of mascarons on grounds both of decorum and verisimilitude: hanging a fantastic head above a void was an affront to reason as well as to taste. By contrast, for many contemporary designers and ornamental sculptors it provided an opportunity for a grander, more exalted (because divine or human) form of ornament.

Provenance

Professor Anthony Blunt, London (1907-1983); Blunt Bequest via the Art Fund 1984

Exhibition History

Drawings Gallery Display - Ornament by Design, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 23/04/2016-12/06/2016

Inscriptions

Watermark: Watermark: lower centre edge, fragment: top of a foolscap.

Inscription: Verso: upper left corner, red chalk, unclear: "46" [?]; right lower edge, graphite: "57"; lower right corner, graphite: "5".

Collector's mark: none.

Information on this object may be incomplete and will be updated as research progresses. We are particularly committed to addressing any discriminatory or offensive language and ideas that might be present in our records. To help improve this record, and to enquire about images of The Courtauld Gallery Collection, please email gallery.collectionsonline@courtauld.ac.uk. Find out more about using and licensing our images.

____________________________

Buy a print from our collection