Figure Study for Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

Elihu Vedder · c. 1884, reworked 1911

Medium

Black wax crayon and a variety of colored wax crayons with graphite and touches of gold pigment, heightened with white gouache on blue wove paper (discolored) laid down on tan board

Original size

64.9 × 46.6 cm (25 9/16 × 18 3/8 in.)

Currently held

Art Institute of Chicago

Movement

Realism

This intimate figure study reveals Elihu Vedder at his most exploratory — a preparatory meditation on the dreaming, languid figures that would define his celebrated illustrations for the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Vedder was one of the most distinctive American artists of the late nineteenth century, drawn to mysticism, classical antiquity, and the symbolist undercurrent running through his era. His working method here is unusually rich: black and coloured wax crayons layered with graphite, touches of gold pigment, and white gouache on blue paper — a surface choice that gives the figure an almost nocturnal glow, pulling warmth from beneath. The reworking in 1911, nearly three decades after the original drawing, speaks to how deeply the Rubaiyat project stayed with him; he returned to these figures the way a poet returns to a line that still feels unfinished. Vedder's 1884 illustrated edition of FitzGerald's translation of the Rubaiyat became a landmark of American book art, and studies like this one show the sustained visual thinking behind it. Our hand-painted oil reproduction translates Vedder's layered, luminous quality into a durable medium, preserving the atmospheric mood and careful draughtsmanship that make the original so quietly arresting.