The Nightmare is a 1781 oil painting by Swiss artist Henry Fuseli. It shows a woman in deep sleep with her arms thrown below her, and with a demonic and ape-like incubus crouched on her chest. The painting’s dreamlike and haunting erotic evocation of infatuation and obsession was a huge popular success.
After its debut at the 1782 Royal Academy of London, critics and patrons reacted with horrified fascination. The work became widely popular, to the extent that it was parodied in political satire and engraved versions were widely distributed. In response, Fuseli produced at least three other versions.
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This painting is briefly but intensely featured in Ken Russell’s berserk 80s movie “Gothic”, a fictional recounting of Lord Byron and friends getting together for demonic games one night in Byron’s castle on a Swiss lake island.
The hallucinations of that night planted the seed of an idea in Mary Shelley’s mind, which became the story of Frankenstein’s monster.Yes! That movie defines “fever dream” for me.
The sleep paralysis demon! You don’t know how accurate this painting is until you have experienced it yourself.