Haunting
Original title: Haunting
kurzbeschreibung
Odilon Redon made "Heimsuchung" (Visitation) between 1893 and 1894 as a lithograph in its fifth and final state. A woman in a long gown stands flanked by two uncanny, stylized faces, while the ground behind them stays dark and shadowed.
Description
Your eye goes first to the woman in her long, elegant dress, placed at the heart of the image and framed by two spectral faces. Above the left face arches a hornlike structure; the right one is encircled by a spiral. Shadows and lines run across the dark ground, giving the picture its somber mood. Everything stays monochrome in shades of gray, with delicate lithographic hatching and shading that bring out textures and forms. The arrangement is asymmetrical: the woman holds the center while the faces press in from either side.
Context
Redon worked on this print during a period when he increasingly used lithography to give form to fantastic, dreamlike subjects. Through the 1890s he kept developing and refining his "Noirs," the black-and-white graphic works. A woman surrounded by eerie apparitions fits his recurring interest in psychological and symbolist themes. The fact that the print survives in its fifth state points to careful reworking of the stone, the kind of revision Redon undertook for his graphic series.
Impact
Oppression and mystery emanate from this sheet; the strong contrasts of gray and the unsettling faces deepen that impression. The stylized woman seems at once elegant and threatened, leaving the viewer caught between fascination and unease. Delicate linework and the dark expanse of ground give the work a quiet but intense tension.
Technique
The sheet was printed as a lithograph in its fifth and final state, which suggests the stone was reworked several times. This technique allows fine gradations of gray through varied hatching and tonal values, characteristic of Redon's graphic work. The sheet measures 47.7 x 34.7 cm, the image area 36.1 x 22.8 cm.
AI-generated description text
Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art · Public Domain (CC0 1.0)