# Chimaera

- By: Louis Jean Desprez (Auxerre, 1743–1804)
- Date: c. 1777 - c. 1784
- Medium: paper
- Classification: print
- Dimensions: height 315 mm x width 375 mm
- Credit line: Purchased with the support of the F.G. Waller-Fonds
- Museum: [Rijksmuseum](https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/collection/object/RP-P-2018-3844--50b517c80ae502b0bd599f010a8fb121)
- Rights: [Public Domain Mark](http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/)
- Picture: https://iiif.micr.io/rWDmW/full/!1920,1080/0/default.jpg
- Who can see it: Kids profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

The architect and set designer Desprez favoured theatrical depictions. Here he offers a free interpretation of a chimera, a hybrid mythological creature, which he turns into a three-headed desert monster hunting for food in front of a run-down palace in North Africa. The partly digested carcass of its last victim still sticks out of its ribcage and the ground is littered with animal remains.