“Entangled in the lines”: Figuring Moby-Dick

This exhibition will display selections from the NBWM’s collection of artwork related to Herman Melville and Moby-Dick, especially drawing on the Elizabeth Schultz collection. The artworks in this exhibition exemplify how Herman Melville’s text is expansive—it is always left up to interpretation. Artists use loose lines, striking colors, and unexpected forms to express various experiences of the novel and create portraits of its individual characters. Together, the prints and drawings impress a sense of the “boggy, soggy, squitchy picture” that Melville’s prose provides.