Design for the Fireworks Display in Paris for the Birth of the Dauphin

A pen-and-ink design with gray and colored wash shows a fireworks setup for the 1781 birth of the Dauphin: a domed rotunda on a rocky grotto, flanked by two fluted columns topped with statues and by jets of fountains. A radiant star-like burst rises above the dome, and the architecture is drawn in precise, symmetrical detail.

Look closer: Small figures reclining among the rocks at the base of the grotto.

Artist

Louis Gustave Taraval

Date

1781

Medium

Pen and black ink, with gray, brown, and colored wash and gouache

Source

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Size

3986 × 2514 px

Credit (appreciated, not required for public-domain works): The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Elisha Whittelsey Collection, The Elisha Whittelsey Fund, 1965