Fuseli, The Nightmare (1781) #art

In 1781, Henry Fuseli painted a woman asleep with a demon crouched on her chest, while a horse with blank white eyes pushes through the curtains. Many people see sleep paralysis in it: waking in the dark, unable to move, with a weight on your chest and the feeling that something is in the room. "Mare" was an old word for a spirit that sat on sleepers' chests. The horse is often read as Fuseli's pun. The Nightmare — Henry Fuseli, 1781. Detroit Institute of Arts. #shorts #sleepparalysis #arthistory #philosophy #art