The Nest Robber
Hubert Robert · 1780s · Art Institute of Chicago
Guide
Adjust the guideNew to it · Medium
Nobody has listened to this guide yet. Making it takes about twenty seconds, and after that anyone can hear it straight away.
From the museum
Hubert Robert began drawing red chalk landscapes as a student in Italy and continued to do so throughout his life, drawing from nature and from his imagination. This charming drawing from his mature career offers a Rococo amorous theme favored by Robert’s predecessors Antoine Watteau and François Boucher—that of bird-catching. The inscription on the rock is from Virgil and translates to “So you not for yourselves build nests, O birds,” a call to be unselfish with one’s creations.
The museum’s own description, in English. Licence: CC BY 4.0
What did you think?
Save this work’s image and museum information on this device to read without a connection.
Ask about this work
Ask in your own words. The answer comes from what the museum has written about the work, and says so when that does not hold it.
Details
- Maker
- Hubert Robert, French, 1733-1808
- Date
- 1780s
- Medium
- Red chalk, with touches of orange chalk, with touches of pen and brown ink, on cream laid paper, incised with a compass, laid down on blue wove board
- Dimensions
- Primary support: 36.3 × 28.7 cm (14 5/16 × 11 5/16 in.); Secondary support: 44.5 × 37 cm (17 9/16 × 14 5/8 in.)
- Place of origin
- France
- Held by
- Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago · Not on view
- Credit line
- Gift of Dorothy Braude Edinburg to the Harry B. and Bessie K. Braude Memorial Collection
Image: Art Institute of Chicago, CC0
