Man on a Rope

ca. 1858–1860

Not on view

Returned to lender

This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.

The subject of these two paintings may be a house painter, since a bucket and a brush appear in a related drawing. In each we are witness to the artist’s process as he worked on the canvas. In the Ottawa painting there are signs of scraping and pentimenti (changes of mind), as well as squaring, which hint that the composition may have been transferred from another support. For the Boston version Daumier repurposed a canvas on which an earlier composition can still be glimpsed through the uppermost layers of paint. During his lifetime, Daumier was better known as a printmaker than a painter, and the function of these private, exploratory works remains unclear. The first known owner of both paintings was Nicolas-Auguste Hazard, whose interest in the artist culminated in his role as coauthor of the earliest catalogue raisonné of Daumier’s prints.

Artwork Details

Overview

Exhibition History

Title: Man on a Rope
Artist: Honoré Daumier (French, Marseilles 1808–1879 Valmondois)
Date: ca. 1858–1860
Geography: Country of Origin France
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 43 9/16 × 28 9/16 in. (110.7 × 72.5 cm)
Frame: 50 3/16 × 35 1/16 × 1 15/16 in. (127.5 × 89 × 5 cm)
Classification: Paintings
Credit Line: National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa. Gift of H.S. Southam, Ottawa, 1950
Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art