''The Nightmare'' is a 1781
oil painting
Oil painting is a painting method involving the procedure of painting with pigments combined with a drying oil as the Binder (material), binder. It has been the most common technique for artistic painting on canvas, wood panel, or oil on coppe ...
by the Swiss artist
Henry Fuseli
Henry Fuseli ( ; ; 7 February 1741 – 17 April 1825) was a Swiss painter, draughtsman, and writer on art who spent much of his life in Britain.
Many of his successful works depict supernatural experiences, such as '' The Nightmare''. He pr ...
. It shows a woman with her arms thrown below her, in deep sleep as she undergoes a
nightmare as an almost hidden horse (the "
night-mare") looks on as a demonic and ape-like
incubus
An Incubus () is a demon, male demon in human form in folklore that seeks to have Sexuality in Christian demonology, sexual intercourse with sleeping women; the corresponding spirit in female form is called a succubus. Parallels exist in many c ...
crouches on her chest. Its erotic and haunting evocation of obsession became a breakthrough success for Fuseli. Critics were taken aback by its overt sexuality, since interpreted as anticipating
Jungian ideas about the
unconscious.
Although Fuseli had unsuccessfully exhibited at the
Royal Academy of London many times earlier, critics reacted with horrified fascination when this painting was shown at his 1782 showing, and the ''Nightmare'' became his first commercially successful work. The image became popular to the extent that he produced at least three other versions, engraved versions became widely distributed, it was parodied in political satire, and became a frequent source for 18th-century
Gothic fiction
Gothic fiction, sometimes referred to as Gothic horror (primarily in the 20th century), is a literary aesthetic of fear and haunting. The name of the genre is derived from the Renaissance era use of the word "gothic", as a pejorative to mean me ...
authors such as
Mary Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley ( , ; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel ''Frankenstein, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an History of science fiction# ...
.
Description
''The Nightmare'' simultaneously offers both the image of a dream—by indicating the effect of the nightmare on the woman—and a dream image—in symbolically portraying the sleeping vision.
[Ellis (2000), pp. 5–8] It depicts a sleeping woman draped over the end of a bed with her head hanging down, exposing her long neck. She is mounted by an
incubus
An Incubus () is a demon, male demon in human form in folklore that seeks to have Sexuality in Christian demonology, sexual intercourse with sleeping women; the corresponding spirit in female form is called a succubus. Parallels exist in many c ...
that peers out at the viewer. The sleeper seems lifeless and lies on her back in a position that produces nightmares.
[Palumbo (1986), pp. 40–42] Her brilliant colouration is set against the darker reds, yellows and
ochre
Ochre ( ; , ), iron ochre, or ocher in American English, is a natural clay earth pigment, a mixture of ferric oxide and varying amounts of clay and sand. It ranges in colour from yellow to deep orange or brown. It is also the name of the colou ...
s of the background; Fuseli used a
chiaroscuro
In art, chiaroscuro ( , ; ) is the use of strong contrasts between light and dark, usually bold contrasts affecting a whole composition. It is also a technical term used by artists and art historians for the use of contrasts of light to ach ...
effect to create strong contrasts between light and shade. The interior is contemporary and fashionable and contains a small table on which rests a mirror,
phial, and book. The room is hung with red velvet curtains which drape behind the bed. Emerging from a parting in the curtain is the head of a horse with bold, pupil-less eyes.
The relationship of the incubus and the horse (
mare
A mare is an adult female horse or other equidae, equine. In most cases, a mare is a female horse over the age of three, and a filly is a female horse three and younger. In Thoroughbred horse racing, a mare is defined as a female horse more th ...
) evokes the notion of
nightmares. The work was likely inspired by the
waking dreams experienced by Fuseli and his contemporaries, who found that these experiences related to folkloric beliefs like the Germanic tales about demons and witches that possessed people who slept alone. In these stories, men were visited by horses or
hags, giving rise to the terms "hag-riding" and "mare-riding", and women were believed to engage in sex with the devil.
The etymology of the word "nightmare" is derived from ', a
Scandinavian mythological term referring to a spirit sent to torment or suffocate sleepers. The early meaning of ''nightmare'' included the sleeper's experience of weight on the chest combined with
sleep paralysis,
dyspnea, or a feeling of dread.
[Stewart (2002), pp. 279–309]
Sleep and dreams were common subjects for Fuseli, although ''The Nightmare'' is unique among his paintings for its lack of reference to literary or religious themes (Fuseli was an ordained minister).
His first known painting was ''
Joseph
Joseph is a common male name, derived from the Hebrew (). "Joseph" is used, along with " Josef", mostly in English, French and partially German languages. This spelling is also found as a variant in the languages of the modern-day Nordic count ...
Interpreting the Dreams of the Butler and Baker of Pharaoh'' (1768), and later he produced ''
The Shepherd's Dream'' (1798) inspired by
John Milton
John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet, polemicist, and civil servant. His 1667 epic poem ''Paradise Lost'' was written in blank verse and included 12 books, written in a time of immense religious flux and politic ...
's ''
Paradise Lost
''Paradise Lost'' is an Epic poetry, epic poem in blank verse by the English poet John Milton (1608–1674). The poem concerns the Bible, biblical story of the fall of man: the temptation of Adam and Eve by the fallen angel Satan and their ex ...
'', and ''Richard III Visited by Ghosts'' (1798) based on
Shakespeare's play.
Fuseli's knowledge of art history was broad, allowing critics to propose sources for the painting's elements in antique, classical, and Renaissance art. According to the art critic Nicholas Powell, the woman's pose may derive from the Vatican's ''
Ariadne
In Greek mythology, Ariadne (; ; ) was a Cretan princess, the daughter of King Minos of Crete. There are variations of Ariadne's myth, but she is known for helping Theseus escape from the Minotaur and being abandoned by him on the island of N ...
'', and the style of the incubus from
figures at Selinunte, an archaeological site in
Sicily
Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...
.
[Russo, Kathleen (1990). pp. 598–99] A source for the woman in
Giulio Romano's ''The Dream of Hecuba'' at the
Palazzo del Te has also been proposed.
[Chappell (1986), pp. 420–422] Powell links the horse to a woodcut by the
German Renaissance artist
Hans Baldung or to the marble ''
Horse Tamers'' on
Quirinal Hill
The Quirinal Hill (; ; ) is one of the Seven Hills of Rome, at the north-east of the city center. It is the location of the official residence of the Italian head of state, who resides in the Quirinal Palace; by metonymy "the Quirinal" has c ...
, Rome.
Fuseli may have added the horse as an afterthought, since a preliminary chalk sketch did not include it. Its presence in the painting has been viewed as a
visual pun on the word "nightmare" and a self-conscious reference to folklore—the horse destabilises the painting's conceit and contributes to its Gothic tone.
Exhibition
The painting was first shown in 1782 at the
Royal Academy of London after which it became widely known.
[Knowles (1831), pp 64–65] Fuseli painted other versions; the original was sold for twenty
guinea
Guinea, officially the Republic of Guinea, is a coastal country in West Africa. It borders the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Guinea-Bissau to the northwest, Senegal to the north, Mali to the northeast, Côte d'Ivoire to the southeast, and Sier ...
s, while an
engraving
Engraving is the practice of incising a design on a hard, usually flat surface by cutting grooves into it with a Burin (engraving), burin. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or Glass engraving, glass ar ...
by
Thomas Burke circulated widely from January 1783, earned the publisher John Raphael Smith more than 500
pounds.
Interpretation
Both the English word ''nightmare''
[Liberman (2005), p. 87] and its German equivalent (
literally ) evoke a malevolent being that causes bad dreams by sitting on the chest of the sleeper.
[Bjorvand and Lindeman (2007), pp. 719–720.] Contemporary writers and critics focused on the painting's then scandalous sexual themes.
[Stewart (2002), p. 282] A few years earlier, Fuseli had fallen for Anna Landholdt in Zürich. She was the niece of his friend the Swiss
physiognomist Johann Kaspar Lavater
Johann Kaspar (or Caspar) Lavater (; 15 November 1741 – 2 January 1801) was a Switzerland, Swiss poet, writer, philosopher, physiognomist and theologian.
Early life
Lavater was born in Zürich, and was educated at the ''Gymnasium (school), Gy ...
. Fuseli wrote of his fantasies to Lavater in 1779: "Last night I had her in bed with me—tossed my bedclothes hugger-mugger—wound my hot and tight-clasped hands about her—fused her body and soul together with my own—poured into her my spirit, breath and strength. Anyone who touches her now commits adultery and incest! She is mine, and I am hers. And have her I will.…"
Fuseli's marriage proposal met with disapproval from Landholdt's father and seems to have been unrequited—she married a family friend soon after. ''The Nightmare'', then, can be seen as a personal portrayal of the erotic aspects of love lost. Art historian
H. W. Janson suggests that the sleeping woman represents Landholdt and that the demon is Fuseli himself. Bolstering this claim is an unfinished portrait of a girl on the back of the painting's canvas, which may portray Landholdt. Anthropologist Charles Stewart characterises the sleeping woman as "voluptuous,"
and one scholar of the Gothic describes her as lying in a "sexually receptive position."
[Davenport-Hines (1999), p. 235] In ''Woman as Sex Object'' (1972), Marcia Allentuck argued that the intent is to show female orgasm. This is supported by Fuseli's sexually overt and even pornographic private drawings (e.g.
Symplegma of Man with Two Women', 1770–78),
while ''The Nightmare'' has been considered representative of
sublimated sexual instincts.
Other interpretations view the incubus as a dream symbol of male
libido
In psychology, libido (; ) is psychic drive or energy, usually conceived of as sexual in nature, but sometimes conceived of as including other forms of desire. The term ''libido'' was originally developed by Sigmund Freud, the pioneering origin ...
, with the sexual act represented by the horse's intrusion through the curtain.
The Royal Academy exhibition brought Fuseli and his painting enduring fame. The exhibition included Shakespeare-themed works by Fuseli, which won him a commission to produce eight paintings for publisher
John Boydell
John Boydell ( ; – 12 December 1804) was an English publisher noted for his reproductions of engravings. He helped alter the trade imbalance between Britain and France in engravings and initiated an English tradition in the art form. A former ...
's
Shakespeare Gallery.
[Chu (2006), p. 81] One version of ''The Nightmare'' hung in the home of Fuseli's close friend and publisher
Joseph Johnson, gracing his weekly dinners for London thinkers and writers.
Fuseli painted other versions of which at least three survive. The most important version was completed between 1790 and 1791 and is in the
Goethe Museum in Frankfurt. It is smaller than the original, and the woman's head lies to the left; a mirror opposes her on the right. The demon is looking at the woman rather than out of the picture, and it has pointed and catlike ears. The most significant difference in the remaining two versions is an erotic statuette of a couple on the table.
[Murray (2004), pp. 810–11]
Influence
Visual arts
''The Nightmare'' was widely copied, with parodies commonly used for political
caricature
A caricature is a rendered image showing the features of its subject in a simplified or exaggerated way through sketching, pencil strokes, or other artistic drawings (compare to: cartoon). Caricatures can be either insulting or complimentary, ...
, including examples by
George Cruikshank
George Cruikshank or Cruickshank ( ; 27 September 1792 – 1 February 1878) was a British caricaturist and book illustrator, praised as the "modern William Hogarth, Hogarth" during his life. His book illustrations for his friend Charles Dicken ...
,
Thomas Rowlandson
Thomas Rowlandson (; 13 July 1757 – 21 April 1827) was an English artist and caricaturist of the Georgian Era, noted for his political satire and social observation. A prolific artist and printmaker, Rowlandson produced both individual soc ...
. In these scenes, the incubus afflicts well known subjects such as
Napoleon
Napoleon Bonaparte (born Napoleone di Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French general and statesman who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led Military career ...
Bonaparte,
Louis XVIII
Louis XVIII (Louis Stanislas Xavier; 17 November 1755 – 16 September 1824), known as the Desired (), was King of France from 1814 to 1824, except for a brief interruption during the Hundred Days in 1815. Before his reign, he spent 23 y ...
, British politician
Charles James Fox
Charles James Fox (24 January 1749 – 13 September 1806), styled ''The Honourable'' from 1762, was a British British Whig Party, Whig politician and statesman whose parliamentary career spanned 38 years of the late 18th and early 19th centurie ...
, and Prime Minister
William Pitt. In another example admiral
Lord Nelson
Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, 1st Duke of Bronte ( – 21 October 1805) was a Royal Navy officer whose leadership, grasp of strategy and unconventional tactics brought about a number of decisive British naval victories during the French ...
is the demon and his mistress
Emma, Lady Hamilton is the sleeper.
While some observers have viewed the parodies as mocking Fuseli, it is more likely that ''The Nightmare'' was simply a vehicle for ridicule of the caricatured subject.
[Tomory (1972), p. 201] The Danish painter,
Nicolai Abildgaard, whom Fuseli had met in Rome, produced an 1800 version of ''The Nightmare'' which develops on the eroticism of Fuseli's work. Abildgaard's painting shows two naked women asleep in the bed; it is the woman in the foreground who is experiencing the nightmare and the incubus—which is crouched on the woman's stomach, facing her parted legs—has its tail nestling between her exposed breasts.
File:Rowlandson Covent Garden Night Mare.jpg, Politician Charles James Fox
Charles James Fox (24 January 1749 – 13 September 1806), styled ''The Honourable'' from 1762, was a British British Whig Party, Whig politician and statesman whose parliamentary career spanned 38 years of the late 18th and early 19th centurie ...
AS the subject of Thomas Rowlandson
Thomas Rowlandson (; 13 July 1757 – 21 April 1827) was an English artist and caricaturist of the Georgian Era, noted for his political satire and social observation. A prolific artist and printmaker, Rowlandson produced both individual soc ...
's satirical etching ''The Covent Garden Night Mare'', 1784
File:Nachtmahr (Abildgaard).jpg, Copy by Nicolai Abraham Abildgaard, 1800, Sorø Art Museum, Denmark
File:Ditlev Blunck, Mareridt, 1846, 0213NMK, Nivaagaards Malerisamling.jpg, Ditlev Blunck's ''Nightmare'', 1846, Nivaagaard Museum, Denmark
Literature
''The Nightmare'' likely influenced
Mary Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley ( , ; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel ''Frankenstein, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an History of science fiction# ...
in a scene from her 1818
Gothic novel
Gothic fiction, sometimes referred to as Gothic horror (primarily in the 20th century), is a literary aesthetic of fear and haunting. The name of the genre is derived from the Renaissance era use of the word "gothic", as a pejorative to mean ...
''
Frankenstein
''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 Gothic novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a Sapience, sapient Frankenstein's monster, crea ...
''. Shelley would have been familiar with the painting; her parents,
Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft ( , ; 27 April 175910 September 1797) was an English writer and philosopher best known for her advocacy of women's rights. Until the late 20th century, Wollstonecraft's life, which encompassed several unconventional ...
and
William Godwin
William Godwin (3 March 1756 – 7 April 1836) was an English journalist, political philosopher and novelist. He is considered one of the first exponents of utilitarianism and the first modern proponent of anarchism. Godwin is most famous fo ...
, knew Fuseli. The iconic imagery associated with the Creature's murder of the protagonist Victor's wife seems to draw from the canvas: "She was there, lifeless and inanimate, thrown across the bed, her head hanging down, and her pale and distorted features half covered by hair."
The novel and Fuseli's biography share a parallel theme: just as Fuseli's incubus is infused with the artist's emotions in seeing Landholdt marry another man, Shelley's monster promises to get revenge on Victor on the night of his wedding. Like Frankenstein's monster, Fuseli's demon symbolically seeks to forestall a marriage.
[Ward, (2000), pp. 20–31] Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe (; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic who is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales involving mystery and the macabre. He is widely re ...
may have evoked ''The Nightmare'' in his 1839 short story "
The Fall of the House of Usher".
[Zimmerman (2005), p. 45] His narrator compares a painting in Usher's house to a Fuseli work, and reveals that an "irrepressible tremor gradually pervaded my frame; and, at length, there sat upon my heart an incubus of utterly causeless alarm".
Poe and Fuseli shared an interest in the subconscious; Fuseli is often quoted as saying that "one of the most unexplored regions of art are dreams".
The painting reverberated with twentieth-century psychological theorists. In 1926, the American writer
Max Eastman visited
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( ; ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating psychopathology, pathologies seen as originating fro ...
and saw a print of the painting next to
Rembrandt's ''
The Anatomy Lesson'' in Freud's apartment in
Vienna
Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...
. The Freud biographer
Ernest Jones chose another version of Fuseli's painting as the
frontispiece of his book ''On the Nightmare'' (1931); however, neither Freud nor Jones mentioned these paintings in their writings about dreams.
Carl Jung
Carl Gustav Jung ( ; ; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist, psychotherapist, and psychologist who founded the school of analytical psychology. A prolific author of Carl Jung publications, over 20 books, illustrator, and corr ...
included ''The Nightmare'' and other of Fuseli works in his ''
Man and His Symbols'' (1964).
[Packer, Sharon (2002), p. 42]
References
Sources
* Chappell, Miles. "Fuseli and the 'Judicious Adoption' of the Antique in the 'Nightmare'". ''Burlington Magazine'', volume 128, issue=999, June 1986
* Chard, Leslie. "Joseph Johnson: Father of the Book Trade". ''Bulletin of the New York Public Library'', Autumn 1975
* Chu, Petra Ten-Doesschate. ''Nineteenth Century European Art'', Prentice Hall Art, 2006.
* Davenport-Hines, Richard. ''Gothic: Four Hundred Years of Excess, Horror, Evil and Ruin''. North Point Press, 1999.
* Darwin, Erasmu. ''The Botanic Garden: A Poem in Two Parts''. Jones & Company, 1825
* Ellis, Markman. ''The History of Gothic Fiction''. Edinburgh University Press, 2000.
* Knowles, John. ''The Life and Writings of Henry Fuseli, Volume 1''. H. Colburn and R. Bentley, 1831
*
Liberman, Anatoly. ''Word Origins And How We Know Them''. Oxford University Press, 2005.
* Mandle, Roger. "A Preparatory Drawing for Henry Fuseli's Painting 'The Shepherd's Dream'". ''Master Drawings'', volume 11, number 3, Autumn, 1973.
* Moffitt, John. "A Pictorial Counterpart to 'Gothick' Literature: Fuseli's ''The Nightmare''". University of Manitoba: ''Mosaic: An Interdisciplinary Critical JournaL'', volume 35, issue 1, 2002.
* Murray, Christopher John. ''Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760–1850''. Taylor & Francis, 2004.
* Packer, Sharon. ''Dreams in Myth, Medicine, and Movies''. New York: Praeger, 2002.
* Palumbo, Donald. ''Eros in the Mind's Eye: Sexuality and the Fantastic in Art and Film''. Greenwood Press, 1986
* Russo, Kathleen (1990). "Henry Fuseli" in James Vinson (ed.), ''International Dictionary of Art and Artists'' vol. 2, ''Art''. Detroit: St. James Press.
* Stewart, Charles. "Erotic Dreams and Nightmares from Antiquity to the Present". ''Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute'', volume 8, issue 2, 2002.
* Tomory, Peter. ''The Life and Art of Henry Fuseli''. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1972. lccn: 72077546
* Ward, Maryanne. "A Painting of the Unspeakable: Henry Fuseli's 'The Nightmare' and the Creation of Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein'". ''The Journal of the Midwest Modern Language Association'', volume 33, issue 1, Winter 2000.
* Zimmerman, Brett. ''Edgar Allan Poe: Rhetoric and Style''. McGill-Queen's University Press, 2005.
Further reading
* Recent exhibit and publication:
Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Imagination'. 15 February–1 May 2006.
Tate Britain, London.
* Jones, E. ''On the Nightmare''. London: Hogarth Press and Institute of Psycho-Analysis, 1931.
External links
Gothic Nightmares: Fuseli, Blake and the Romantic Imagination 2006 exhibition at the
Tate
Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its main sponsor is the UK ...
, London
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nightmare, The
1781 paintings
Romantic paintings
Paintings by Henry Fuseli
Horses in art
Paintings in the Detroit Institute of Arts
Demons in art
Fiction about nightmares
Incubi
Paintings of women
Oil on canvas paintings