Exhibition Notes & Curatorial Commentary
Henry Fuseli (1741–1825) was a Swiss-born painter, writer, and teacher who became one of the most imaginative figures in British art. Born Johann Heinrich Füssli in Zürich, he initially trained for the clergy and received a strong humanist education in classical literature. After leaving Switzerland in the 1760s, he settled in London, where Sir Joshua Reynolds encouraged him to pursue art professionally. Fuseli later spent several years in Rome studying Michelangelo, whose powerful anatomy and dramatic figures deeply shaped his style.\n\nReturning to London in 1779, Fuseli built a career around literary, mythological, supernatural, and visionary subjects inspired by Shakespeare, Milton, Homer, folklore, dreams, and Nordic legend. His exaggerated gestures, theatrical lighting, elongated bodies, and psychological intensity made his work strikingly different from conventional academic painting.\n\nFuseli became a Royal Academician in 1790 and later served as Professor of Painting and Keeper of the Royal Academy. His lectures and teaching influenced younger artists, including William Blake. Through his fascination with terror, fantasy, desire, and the uncanny, Fuseli helped anticipate Romanticism, Gothic art, Symbolism, and later explorations of the unconscious, securing his reputation as one of the era’s most original painters. He died in 1825 after decades of bold artistic experimentation.