The New International Encyclopædia/Füessli
FÜESSLI, fusle, or FÜSSLI. A Swiss
family, originally from Zurich, several members of
which were artists. , called The Old
(1598-1665), the first engraver-painter of the
family, studied in Italy, and produced some
excellent battle-pictures and portraits. A
descendant,  (1707-82), also an
artist, painted portraits, but is celebrated for
his work on Swiss artists, Geschichte und
Abbildungen der besten Künstler in der Schweiz
(1769-79). Another descendant was  (1742-1825), born at Zurich, and called
in England Henry Fuseli. He studied in Berlin,
London, and Italy, and finally made his home in
London. In 1786 he painted a series of pictures
illustrating Shakespeare, and these were followed
in 1799 by forty-nine paintings for Paradise Lost.
His powerful imagination makes these curious
works, often purely metaphysical, very interesting;
but he was not a colorist, and he never
considered the factor of beauty. He became
professor at the Royal Academy, and gave some
lectures on art which were in many ways
remarkable. He wrote a dictionary of painters,
some notes on Swiss art, and a study of Michelangelo.
An edition of most of his works was
published in Zurich (1808).