Faust and Marguerite
Hendrik Jan August Leys, Belgian, 1815 - 1869
Geography:
Made in Antwerp, Belgium, Europe
Date:
1856Medium:
Oil on panelDimensions:
39 1/4 x 69 3/4 inches (99.7 x 177.2 cm)Curatorial Department:
European Painting
E1924-3-83Credit Line:
The William L. Elkins Collection, 1924
Made in Antwerp, Belgium, Europe
Date:
1856Medium:
Oil on panelDimensions:
39 1/4 x 69 3/4 inches (99.7 x 177.2 cm)Curatorial Department:
European Painting
* Gallery 155, European Art 1850-1900, first floor
Accession Number:E1924-3-83Credit Line:
The William L. Elkins Collection, 1924
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composition studies [x] flemish [x] literary [x] medieval [x] romanticism [x]This painting shows a moment in Goethe's dramatic poem Faust.
Faust stands with the demonic Mephistopheles behind an iron screen, and he first spies the chaste Marguerite emerging from a church. Faust demands that Mephistopheles secure Marguerite's love for him. Leys has followed Goethe's description in his depiction of Marguerite as a young woman of modest or lower social standing with red lips, glowing cheeks, and downcast eyes.
Like many nineteenth-century artists, Leys was interested in the Middle Ages. Here he dresses the characters in medieval costume and sets the scene at a medieval cathedral in Antwerp, Belgium.
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