Orpheus (c. 1903–10): Art, History and Details

Orpheus (c. 1903–10) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Odilon Redon (French, 1840–1916).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Drawn in vivid layers of pastel crayon, this work depicts the head of the poet and musician Orpheus. The story of the god of music, whose music carried on after his death through his lyre and head, fascinated Redon, who related to Orpheus's dedication to his art. The subject also aligned with Redon's broader interest in dreams and spirituality around this time and he represented Orpheus several times throughout his career, in various media. Here, the god's head floats as if in stasis while Mount Parnassus—the home of Apollo and the Muses—soars from behind.

Object facts

• Title: Orpheus
• Date: c. 1903–10
• Creator attribution: Odilon Redon (French, 1840–1916)
• Culture: France
• Type: Drawing
• Technique: pastel on brown paper
• Dimensions: Sheet: 68.8 x 56.8 cm (27 1/16 x 22 3/8 in.)
• Collection: DR - French
• Department: Drawings
• Accession number: 1926.25

A detail from the museum

Another version of this pastel (now in the collection of the Musée Fabre de Montpellier) was part of a group of later works by Redon shown at the 1913 International Exhibition of Modern Art—better known as the Armory Show—which introduced the artist to American audiences.

Collection credit

Gift from J. H. Wade

Further reading listed by the museum

• Catalogue of International Exhibition of Modern Art: Association of American Painters and Sculptors : at the Armory of the Sixty-Ninth Infantry, Lexington Avenue, Twenty-Fifth and Twenty-Sixth Streets, New York, from February Fifteenth to March Fifteenth, Nineteen Hundred and Thirteen from Ten a.M. to Ten P.M. (Sundays Included). New York: Vreeland Advertising Press, 1913.
• Loan Exhibition of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Paintings. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1921.
• Watson, Margaret W. "Odilon Redon, A Great French Lyricist." The Arts 2, no. 5 (1922): 273-276.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.