FOTO PRESENTI 24
	Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY WOLFRAM INTRODUCING BERTRAND OF NAVARRE TO THE PLACE WHERE HE HAD CONFINED HIS WIFE WITH THE SKELETON OF HER LOVER circa 1812-1820 Oil on canvas, 970 x 700 mm The lord of a castle shows an unseen visitor his faithless wife, secreted in a sepulchral chamber, embracing the headless, skeletal remains of her lover. A young admirer recalled Fuseli telling the story: ‘At breakfast Fuseli mentioned a picture which he had just sketched from an ancient German Ballad and promised at night to relate the Story – for he said it must be at night – “I can only tell it at night” Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination JAMES GILLRAY WIERD SISTERS; MINISTERS OF DARKNESS; Minions of the Moon published by Hannah Humphrey, 23 December 1791 25 x 35 mm Lent by The British Museum, London Here, Gillray uses Fuseli’s painting The Weird Sisters as the basis of a political satire. The home secretary Lord Dundas, William Pitt the prime minister and Lord Thurlow, the Lord Chancellor, are cast as Fuseli’s witches. The moon is made up of the distinctive profiles of George III and Queen Charlotte. The print satirises the uneasy and unnatural alliance of these politicians, and the reputed lunacy of George. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination PHILIP JAMES DE LOUTHERBOURG VISITOR TO A MOONLIT CHURCHYARD 1790 Oil on canvas, 863 x 685 mm Lent by the Paul Mellon Collection, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven A figure stands in the overgrown ruins of an abbey, contemplating the remnants of an old painting showing the Resurrection. Above the figure of Christ a sundial throws a long moonlight shadow, suggesting the imminence of death and the possibility of Christian salvation. The ruin is identifiable as Tintern Abbey in the Wye Valley. This was one of the most-visited tourist sites of the late eighteenth-century, favoured because of its emotive historical associations with the Protestant Reformation Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination MARIA COSWAY UNIDENTIFIED SCENE circa 1780s Pen and ink and wash on paper 283 x 356 mm Lent by the Victoria and Albert Museum, London Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY TWO COURTESANS WITH FANTASTIC HAIRSTYLES AND HATS circa 1796 Pen with brown, pink and grey wash on paper 179 x 162 mm Lent by Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki purchased 1965 1965/47 Fuseli drew numerous studies like this, showing women in weird and wonderful head-dresses and hats. They represent an apparently obsessive and highly sexualised vision of femininity. Here, the indication of a window frame is suggestive; are these prostitutes looking down on their prospective clients, or are they figures in a theatre Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY TITANIA AND BOTTOM circa 1790 Oil on canvas, 2172 x 2756 mm Presented by Miss Julia Carrick Moore in accordance with the wishes of her sister 1887 Titania, the queen of the fairies, has been made by her jealous husband Oberon to fall in love with Bottom, whose head has been magically transformed into that of an ass. Bottom orders her fairies to serve his whims. Peaseblossom scratches his head, Mustardseed rubs his nose, Cobweb, standing on Bottom's outstretched hand, is ordered to kill a bumblebee. The painting was commissioned by John Boydell for his Shakespeare Gallery. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY TITANIA AWAKENING (TITANIAS ERWACHEN) 1785-1790 Oil on canvas, 2220 x 2800 mm Lent by the Kunstmuseum, Winterthur. Presented by George Reinhart, 1946 Titania, the queen of the fairies, wakes and tells Oberon of her dream in which she was in love with an ass. Oberon explains that she has been enchanted. A group of good fairies appear on the left. To the right, Bottom sleeps surrounded by evil spirits, including a wicked imp riding a 'nightmare'. This was the second painting of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595-6) commissioned from Fuseli by John Boydell. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination G Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination H Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY SATAN STARTING FROM THE TOUCH OF ITHURIEL'S SPEAR (Satan flieht, von Ithuriels Speer beruht) 1779 Oil on canvas, 2305 x 2763 mm Lent by the Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart Milton’s Satan, represented here as a heroically-proportioned figure, leaps back from the slightest touch of the angel Ithuriel’s spear. He protects Adam and Eve, who slumber in each other’s arms at the bottom of the composition. This canvas was exhibited by Fuseli at the Royal Academy in 1780. It was one of the works which made his reputation as a painter of infernal subject-matter Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination N Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination GILLRAY JAMES A PHANTASMAGORIA – SCENE – CONJURING-UP AN ARMED SKELETON 5 January 1803 image: 279 x 245 mm With permission of the Warden and Scholars of New College, Oxford The three witches from Shakespeare’s Macbeth (1606) are shown wearing the features of contemporary opposition politicians, including Charles James Fox. The print criticises the Peace of Amiens made with France in 1802, which was perceived as sacrificing Britain’s interests. The feigned oval suggests that the whole scene may be a phantasmagorical projection of the type popular at this time. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination N Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination BLAKE WILLIAM THE BLASPHEMER circa 1800 Pen and ink and watercolour on paper, 384 x 340 mm Bequeathed by Miss Alice G.E. Carthew 1940 Here, Blake renders rather slight Biblical references as a scene of fantastic, grotesque physical drama. The source is thought to be the story of Moses condemning to death the blasphemous son of an Israelite woman (Leviticus, Chapter 24). But it has also been suggested that the subject is, ‘The Stoning of Achan’ (Joshua, Chapter 7). Having confessed to coveting rich clothes, gold and silver, Achan is condemned to death by stoning and his worldly goods burned. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY HEPHAESTUS, BIA AND CRATO SECURING PROMETHEUS ON MOUNT CAUCASUS circa 1810 Pencil and watercolour on paper, 359 x 302 mm Lent by Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, purchased 1965 (1965/80) Illustrating the opening scene of Aeschylus’s Prometheus Bound, this design shows the rebel Titan bound foot, arm and chest to a mountaintop; Crato, holding down Prometheus’ right arm, commands Hephaestus, the god of fire, to drive a spike through his heart. Bia holds the spike to his chest in preparation. Fuseli’s treatment of this theme suggests a provocative fusion of sex and violence. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination THOMAS ROWLANDSON THE COVENT GARDEN NIGHT MARE 1784 Coloured etching Westminster Library and Archives This was among the earliest satirical designs to be based on The Nightmare. It shows the famously portly and dissolute Whig politician Charles James Fox (1749-1806) in the role of Fuseli’s maiden, here in a sleep troubled by his gambling debts – referred to by the dice and dicebox on the low table – and the forthcoming election in Westminster. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY AN INCUBUS LEAVING TWO SLEEPING WOMEN (Der Alp verlasst das Lager sweir shlafender Frauen) 1810 Pencil and wash on paper, 318 x 408 mm Lent by the Kunsthaus, Zurich, Grafische Sammlung An evil imp has visited two naked young women, and is shown departing on a demonic horse through the window. One of the women stretches as she wakes, her face indicating she has been troubled (or perhaps exhausted) by the night’s activities. The composition may suggest a kind of addled fairy-tale, with the sleeping beauties awakened by the departure of the beast. It evokes the themes of erotic arousal and sexual initiation that underlie many classic stories. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination FUSELI HENRY THE OATH ON THE RüTLI (Die drei Eidgenossen beim Schwur auf dem Rütli) 1779-1780 Oil on canvas 2670 x 1780 mm Lent by the Kunsthaus, Zurich (deposited by the Canton of Zurich, 1989) This painting presents the key episode in Swiss medieval history as an extravagant physical drama. Representatives of the three original cantons (states) of Switzerland meet on the Rütli (a meadow on the western shore of Lake Lucerne) and promise to overthrow the tyrannical rule of the Austrian empire. Their revolution took place in 1307, and was seen as establishing a democratic spirit in Swiss politics. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination BLAKE WILLIAM THE GOOD AND EVIL ANGELS STRUGGLING FOR POSSESSION OF A CHILD circa 1790-4 Pen and watercolour on paper, 295 x 442 mm Lent by the Trustees of the Cecil Higgins Art Gallery, Bedford In a vast landscape, two angels struggle over a baby. The blond figure is the Good Angel; the dark figure clasping at the child is Evil. The allegory was invented by Blake, but alludes to traditional ideas about angels struggling over souls in Purgatory (that is, caught between Heaven and Hell). This watercolour was the basis of a large colour print by Blake of around 1795, shown nearby. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination JAMES GILLRAY TALES OF WONDER! 1 February 1802 Uncoloured etching and aquatint, 260 x 358 mm Lent by Andrew Edmunds, London Gillray shows a group of women reading from Lewis’s famously lurid novel, The Monk (1796). A review of The Monk from 1802 summed up the morally righteous view of the novel: ‘all the faults and immoralities ascribed to novels, will be found realized in the Monk. Gillray’s print mocks the taste for such salacious and violent materials among the middle classes. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination JOHN DOWNMAN THE GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRA AWAKENING THE FURIES 1781 Oil on panel, 508 x 648 mm Lent by the Paul Mellon Collection, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven The subject is from the Greek tragedy The Furies by Aeschylus. The ghost of the wicked Clytemnstra arouses the demonic ‘Furies’ to pursue her murderer, Orestes. Downman’s picture is crowded with grotesque, almost caricatured, detail. This work was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1782. A critic said it was ‘proof how artists sometimes lose themselves, and mistake their talents’. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination HENRY FUSELI MACBETH CONSULTING THE VISION OF THE ARMED HEAD 1793-1794 Oil on canvas, 1630 x 1300 mm Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington Shakespeare’s Macbeth has asked the ‘Weird Sisters’ to predict whether he will become king. The apparition of an helmeted head warns, ‘Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth! Beware Macduff’, referring to his political rival. Fuseli noted that he had made the features of the spectral head resemble Macbeth’s own: would not this make a powerful impression on your mind? Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination BLAKE WILLIAM HECATE circa 1795 Colour print finished in ink and watercolour on paper, 439 x 581 mm Presented by W. Graham Robertson 1939 A witch, stripped to the waist, is accompanied by two youthful figures, apparently a boy and a girl. Above their heads we can see the silhouette of a bat in the gloomth, and a weird feline-faced bat-winged thing. Among the rocks to the left, are a wide-eyed owl, a newt or toad, and an ass. The subject of this print has been much discussed. It was traditionally called ‘Hecate’. Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination BLAKE WILLIAM OBERON, TITANIA AND PUCK WITH FAIRIES DANCING circa 1786 Pencil and watercolour on paper, 475 x 675 mm Presented by Alfred A. de Pass in memory of his wife Ethel 1910 This watercolour probably represents the closing scene of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595-6). The king and queen of the fairies, Oberon and Titania, embrace to the left, reunited at last after the separation which had set in motion the comic action of the preceding evening. Puck prances playfully next to them, his upraised arms and pointed ears recalling classical treatments of Bacchus or satyrs.

Gothic Nightmares explores the work of Henry Fuseli (1741–1825) and William Blake (1757–1827) in the context of the Gothic – the taste for fantastic and supernatural themes which dominated British culture from around 1770 to 1830. Featuring over 120 works by these artists and their contemporaries, the exhibition creates a vivid image of a period of cultural turmoil and daring artistic invention. The central exhibit is Henry Fuseli’s famous The Nightmare 1781. Ever since it was first exhibited to the public in 1782, this picture has been an icon of horror. Showing a woman supine in her boudoir, oppressed by a foul imp while a ferocious-looking horse glares on, the painting draws on folklore and popular culture, medicine, concepts of imagination, and classical art to create a new kind of highly charged horror image. This is the most extensive display of Fuseli’s art seen in Britain since 1975 and includes around sixty of his most important canvases and drawings including Titania and Bottom c1790, The Three Witches 1783 and The Shepherd’s Dream. A selection of works by Fuseli’s contemporaries and followers, dealing with themes of fantasy, horror and perverse sexuality, complement his work. This includes over twenty-five exceptional watercolours and paintings by the visionary artist William Blake, among which will be The Night of Enitharmon’s Joy, The House of Death c1795; his vampire-like Ghost of a Flea, The Whirlwind: Ezekial’s Vision c1803–5; The Witch of Endor Raising the Spirit of Samuel 1783 and Death on a Pale Horse c1800. The exhibition is further enriched with works on Gothic and fantastic themes by, among others, Joseph Wright of Derby, George Romney, James Barry and Maria Cosway, John Flaxman and Theodore von Holst, and features a large group of caricatures by James Gillray, whose satirical works incorporate some of the most inventive cosmic and fantastic imagery of the era. A special section of the exhibition presents a recreation of a ‘Phantasmagoria’ show – a kind of animated slideshow with sound effects and shocking images – giving visitors to the exhibition a chance to experience at first hand the same chills and thrills as their forebears in the 1800s. As a literary phenomenon, the Gothic has had an enduring influence. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), and the novels of Matthew ‘Monk’ Lewis, William Beckford and Ann Radcliffe are still widely read. Modern Gothic novelists including Angela Carter, Patrick McGrath and Toni Morrison are highly regarded, and the Gothic continues to influence film and TV – from classics like Nosferatu (1922) through to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997–2002) – and visual artists like Glenn Brown and the Chapman brothers. This exhibition is the first to explore the roots of this phenomenon in the visual arts of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. The exhibition is curated by Martin Myrone and accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue featuring essays by Professor Sir Christopher Frayling on The Nightmare and the heritage of horror, and Professor Marina Warner on Fuseli’s fairies.

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