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Monkey Preaching to Turkeys
circle of Christophe Huet (French, 1700–1759)
1750–1800
- Medium
- Gouache
- Classification
- Drawing
- Dimensions
- Sheet: 32.2 x 39.6 cm (12 11/16 x 15 9/16 in.)
- Culture
- France
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Drawings
- Credit line
- Bequest of Muriel Butkin
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Little Ones profiles and older: it shows gentle subjects for the very young. How works are placed
View at the Cleveland Museum of Art
About this work
This work belongs to a genre of imagery called singerie, which depicts monkeys dressed in human clothes parodying the actions of people. Here, a monkey preaches to a flock of turkeys from a wicker basket pulpit hanging from a tree. The turkeys, interpreted as symbols of foolishness, are deceived by the cunning primate in the disguise of a monk’s habit.
