The Nightmare

The Nightmare is a 1781 oil painting by the Swiss artist Henry Fuseli. It shows a woman with her arms thrown below her, in deep sleep as she undergoes a nightmare as an almost hidden horse (the "night-mare") looks on as a demonic and ape-like incubus crouches on her chest. Its erotic and haunting evocation of obsession became a breakthrough success for Fuseli. Critics were taken aback by its overt sexuality, since interpreted as anticipating psychoanalytic ideas about the unconscious. Although Fuseli had unsuccessfully exhibited at the Royal Academy of London many times earlier, critics reacted with horrified fascination when this painting was shown at his 1782 showing, and the Nightmare became his first commercially successful work. The image became popular to the extent that he produced at least three other versions, engraved versions became widely distributed, it was parodied in political satire, and became a frequent source for 19th-century Gothic fiction authors such as Mary Shelley.

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