The Cathedral

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The Cathedral

Artist James Ensor (Belgian, 1860-1949)

Date1886

DimensionsImage: 9 5/8 × 7 1/4 in. (24.4 × 18.4 cm)
Sheet: 18 7/8 × 13 7/8 in. (47.9 × 35.2 cm)

MediumEtching

ClassificationPrints

Credit LineFrederick B. and Kate L. Shoemaker Fund

Object number

2017.4

Not on View

Label TextCreated in 1886, shortly after James Ensor began making prints, The Cathedral is remarkable for both its painstaking detail and its visual tension. The looming, oversized cathedral rising into the sky contrasts with the mass of tiny people spreading horizontally across the print. This contrast might recall tensions between church and state, institution and individual. The Cathedral’s cramped composition, with buildings and people extending off the page, mimics Ensor’s own cluttered work environment. His parents’ home in Ostend, Belgium, also functioned as a tourist shop, and Ensor set up his studio in the attic, his art supplies surrounded by miscellaneous books, figurines, and shells.Published ReferencesTaylor, Sue, 'James Ensor, La Cathédrale (the Cathedral), 1886,' in A Breadth of Vision, the Ritz Collection, Milwaukee Art Museum, 1992, pp. 61-62.

Bown-Taevernier, S., Hoozee, R. & Heijbroek, J.F, Moi, James Ensor, trans. Catherine Warnant et al, Paris, Albin Michel, 1987, p.219.

Lebeer, Louis, 'The Prints of James Ensor.' New York, DaCapo Press, 1971, p. ix.