The Eye, Like a Strange Balloon Moves Towards Infinity

1882

Lithograph on China paper, image 26.3 × 19.8 cm. The Art Institute of Chicago

A giant eye, fringed with lashes, floats over a dark plain like a balloon. Its pupil rolls upward, toward the open sky.

The caption points toward infinity, something no one can see. The print gives that abstract idea a strange, concrete shape instead of recording an observed sight.
It is the first plate of the album To Edgar Poe.
Look below the eye: a small head sits in the basket-like gondola hanging from it.
He learned transfer lithography in 1878, and most of his prints were made for albums.
It came to the Art Institute in 1920 as part of the Stickney Collection.

The album was dedicated to the American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art holds a complete copy of it.