Lumiere: Lithographs by Odilon Redon, The Fitzwilliam Museum

The only thing to be regretted about the female nudes, shrieking demons and religious irony in Odilon Redon’s work is that they make it difficult simply to discuss these extraordinary lithographs; you almost have to defend them. Yet by defending them one also runs the risk of making them out to be less harrowing, less engrossing than they truly are. Indeed, as the Fitzwilliam’s dazzling current exhibition makes clear, this French Symbolist made a stylistic principle out of his ability to shock. His renderings of death and trauma are both too alive with pathos and too well crafted to feel gratuitous .

Most recognised for his use of pastels and oil, the marginal status of Redon’s drawing is celebrated by the small, wood panelled room in which they are now displayed. Here, set curiously off from the permanent collection, are fewer than thirty examples of Redon’s artistic vision and virtuosity. But in Lumière this economy of selection is not frustrating. Because Redon is so visually rewarding; with virtually every lithograph there is simply an overwhelming amount to perceive on the paper

This is indicated by the abstract, even absurdist, titles Redon gave to each artwork: ‘Death: my irony surpasses all’ or ‘And the eyes without heads were floating like molluscs’. Although such statements may sound flatly undrawable, it's great to see Redon’s, often successful, attempts to sketch them. In the particularly striking ‘Isis’, for instance, the eponymous mother cradles a child, her brightly etched features partly obscured by a wave of blank ink, darkening as it swirls from the picture plane.  An intense gesture which points us beyond the work itself, Redon is always striving towards - before slipping past -  shockingly luminous moments like this, where his mind’s eye and those of the viewer are beautifully united.