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Leopold Bloom

1983
Not on view
James Joyce’s modernist epic Ulysses (1922) follows the wanderings of the unlikely protagonist Leopold Bloom over a single day—June 16, 1904. For Hamilton, Joyce’s novel offered a model of how to combine diverse styles and techniques in a single work. Hamilton began composing illustrations for the book between 1948 and 1949, when he made some twenty-eight preliminary drawings and studies. One of the first was a portrait of Bloom, intended as a frontispiece for the book. Almost forty years later, he transferred his drawing to an etching plate, using a roulette tool to simulate pencil marks in a style reminiscent of Picasso’s Neoclassical phase of the early 1920s.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Leopold Bloom
  • Artist: Richard Hamilton (British, London 1922–2011 Oxfordshire)
  • Date: 1983
  • Medium: Soft ground etching, roulette, engraving and aquatint
  • Edition: 42/120 + 12 artist's proofs
  • Dimensions: 29 15/16 × 22 5/16 in. (76 × 56.7 cm)
  • Classification: Prints
  • Credit Line: Purchase, Reba and Dave Williams Gift, 2000
  • Object Number: 2000.388
  • Rights and Reproduction: © 2025 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
  • Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art

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Lobby, Richard Hamilton British, Color collotype and screenprint
Lobby
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Self-Portrait, Richard Hamilton British, Color screenprint
Self-Portrait
Richard Hamilton
1967
Portrait of Dieter Roth, Richard Hamilton British, Inkjet print
Portrait of Dieter Roth
Richard Hamilton
1998
Swingeing London 67, Richard Hamilton British, Etching, aquatint, photoetching, and collage, embossed and die stamped with metallic foil
Swingeing London 67
Richard Hamilton
Petersburg Press
1968
Five Tyres Remoulded
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1971

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