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Pin-prick picture
unknown - Enlarge image
Pin-prick picture
- Place of origin:
England, Great Britain (made)
- Date:
ca. 1830 (made)
- Artist/Maker:
unknown (production)
- Materials and Techniques:
Pin-pricked paper
- Credit Line:
Bequeathed by Mrs E. Bardsley
- Museum number:
E.763-1949
- Gallery location:
British Galleries, room 120, case 15, shelf DR3
Object Type
This unusual image of a man holding a chair has been created by pricking holes in a piece of paper. Pin-prick pictures were just one of many ways in which paper was used without paint or pencil to create images as a genteel way to pass the time.
Materials & Making
On the back of this piece of paper is a very light sketch in graphite of the figure and chair. The outline of the figure has been pricked from the front of the paper. The figure's shadowing has been pricked from the back. It appears dark because of the density of the pricks and the shadows cast by the raised edges of the pushed-through paper.
Paper
By the end of the 18th century it was a favourite pastime to work in paper using a variety of techniques to create images and decorative effects. Special shops sprang up to cater for this taste, most famously Rudolph Ackermann's 'Repository' in London's Strand. This shop, and others such as Fuller's 'Temple of Fancy', stocked materials for amateur painters but also what were called fancy papers: coloured and embossed paper designed to allow amateurs to create decorative work in paper. This pin-prick picture is an example of a more simple but equally challenging use of paper.
