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Overthrow of the Tyrant

Daniel Chodowiecki

Basic information

ID: Г-IV-2829
Author: Daniel Chodowiecki
Name: Overthrow of the Tyrant
Previous attributions: Attack
Date of creation: 1790s
Country: Germany
Technique: etching
Material: paper
Dimensions: 11.3 x 6.8 cm (height x width)

Additionally

Type: graphic art
Genre: history painting symbolic art
Provenance: Purchased from O. Bushel, 1977

Information about author

Author: Daniel Chodowiecki
Artist's lifetime: 1726–1801
Country: Poland, Germany
Biography: Daniel Nikolaus Chodowiecki (1726, Gdańsk – 1801, Berlin) – a Polish-German artist, printmaker and painter, a master of etching and book illustration, a representative of the academic movement, and one of the leading exponents of sentimentalism in 18th-century German art.
The artist's father was a merchant, a descendant of a noble family. His mother came from a family of Swiss Huguenots. The young Daniel, continuing the family tradition, began working as a merchant. At the age of 17, he went to Berlin for a commercial apprenticeship, where he spent most of his life. Towards the end of his career, he became the director of the Prussian Academy of Arts (Preußische Akademie der Künste).
In the 1750s, the artist developed an interest in painting, and later in printmaking, becoming one of the leading book illustrators. Between 1770 and 1774, together with Johann Bernhard Basedow, the founder of the philanthropic movement in education, he worked on the four-volume publication "Elementary Textbook for Young People" ("Elementarwerk für die Jugend"). Chodowiecki created over 100 illustrations for it using the copper engraving technique, including some dedicated to the Crusades.
In 1781, the artist produced 12 illustrations for a play by Gustav Friedrich Wilhelm Großmann entitled "No More Than Six Dishes" ("Nicht mehr als sechs Schüsseln"). This comedy, with its strongly social-critical undertones, is considered one of the earliest outstanding dramatic works in German bourgeois literature.
Around 2,000 engravings by Chodowiecki on various subjects, executed in the techniques of etching and copper engraving, have survived to this day. One of his contemporaries wrote that, were it not for Chodowiecki's illustrations, countless books would never have found their readers. The artist created a large number of painted and graphic portraits, as well as genre scenes of burgher life, mostly executed in pen and ink. The total number of the artist's surviving drawings amounts to around 4,000.
Daniel Chodowiecki's works are held in Germany – at the Kupferstichkabinett (Museum of Prints and Drawings) in Berlin, the Museum of Fine Arts in Leipzig, and the Städel Museum in Frankfurt; in Poland – at the National Museum in Gdańsk; in Ukraine – at Borys Voznytskyi Lviv National Art Gallery, Vasyl Stefanyk Lviv National Scientific Library of Ukraine and the Kharkiv Art Museum, as well as in museums in Washington, Madrid and London.

Object description

The print on an ancient theme was inspired by the events of the French Revolution and the execution of King Louis XVI in 1792. It likely depicts the uprising against Emperor Commodus in Rome in 192, when a mob led by the athlete Narcissus overthrew the ruler. In the foreground on the right, the conspirators have laid face down the emperor whom they have just deposed. One of them, presumably a pretender to the throne, dressed in a tunic with a feather on his head and a necklace around his neck, pins the head of the fallen tyrant to the floor with his foot. He is surrounded by other men. On the left is the imperial throne, with two sphinxes placed on its armrests. At the top of the throne sits a harpy. With one paw raised, it looks down upon the horrific scene. By depicting this monster, the artist hints that the new ruler will be no better than the predecessor.

Inscriptions

Below the image, on the left, the artist's signature is engraved: "D. Chodowiecki del". Below the image, on the right – the engraver's signature.

Legal regulation

Borys Voznytskyi Lviv National Art Gallery