Ariel
Oil Painting
1826 (painted)
1826 (painted)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
Severn took the image from Shakespeare's play, The Tempest, where the mischievous sprite Ariel sings:
There I couch when owls do cry.
On a bat's back I do fly…
He was a close friend of the poet John Keats in Rome, where this work was painted. He exhibited several paintings of Ariel at the Royal Academy. There is another in the V&A collection (see 1416-1869).
There I couch when owls do cry.
On a bat's back I do fly…
He was a close friend of the poet John Keats in Rome, where this work was painted. He exhibited several paintings of Ariel at the Royal Academy. There is another in the V&A collection (see 1416-1869).
Object details
| Category | |
| Object type | |
| Title | Ariel (assigned by artist) |
| Materials and techniques | oil on millboard backed with canvas |
| Brief description | Oil painting, 'Ariel', Joseph Severn, 1826 |
| Physical description | Oil painting |
| Dimensions |
|
| Style | |
| Marks and inscriptions | 'Severn/Rome 1826' (Signed and dated by the artist, lower left) |
| Credit line | Bequeathed by Rev. Chauncey Hare Townshend |
| Object history | Bequeathed by Rev. Chauncey Hare Townshend, 1868 |
| Subjects depicted | |
| Literary reference | The Tempest by William Shakespeare |
| Summary | Severn took the image from Shakespeare's play, The Tempest, where the mischievous sprite Ariel sings: There I couch when owls do cry. On a bat's back I do fly… He was a close friend of the poet John Keats in Rome, where this work was painted. He exhibited several paintings of Ariel at the Royal Academy. There is another in the V&A collection (see 1416-1869). |
| Bibliographic reference | Catalogue of British Oil Paintings 1820-1860, Ronald Parkinson, Victoria and Albert Museum, London: HMSO, 1990, pp. 261-62 |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | 1410-1869 |
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| Record created | May 12, 2003 |
| Record URL |
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