A Philosopher Shewing an Experiment on the Air Pump

Discussion

FROM THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO’S CATALOG

The consummate mezzotint engraver Valentine Green created this iconic image a year after the Enlightenment-era painter Joseph Wright of Derby completed the original painting (National Gallery, London). Green’s limpid moonlit effects and riveting velvet-black ink aptly render this nocturnal scientific demonstration as a matter of life or death: the bird in the glass sphere begins to suffocate as air is pumped out of the chamber, leaving the breathless viewers uncertain of its ultimate fate.

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