The Arrival of the Muses of Art at Architecture
1890
Jan Toorop Dutch, 1858–1928
Netherlands
Jan Toorop was born in Indonesia, raised in the Netherlands, and married to an English wife. His art was as diverse as his cultural background. He experimented with many different styles, from Impressionism to Symbolism, and was adaptable even when working on a single image. This composition must have evolved as he drew. It comprises three individual pieces of paper.
Traversing a watery expanse, personifications of the arts (music, painting, poetry or literature, and sculpture) come to alleviate laborers from drudgery. The muse of architecture sits unshackled at the foot of the image.
Pen and brown ink and colored crayons on cream wove paper (discolored to buff), pieced