A Nightmare

François-Nicolas Chifflart's etching depicts a sleeping figure tormented by demonic apparitions crowding the darkness above. The composition uses sharp contrasts between the illuminated sleeper and the shadowy forms surrounding them—a visual strategy common to 19th-century printmaking. This work predates the newspaper comic strip by decades, yet employs sequential narrative through accumulated imagery: the layering of supernatural presences creates narrative tension without panels or captions. Chifflart, a French illustrator and etcher, worked in the romantic tradition, exploring psychological states through dense, expressive linework. Such prints influenced later visual storytelling conventions, demonstrating how artists developed methods to convey complex emotional and narrative content through graphic arrangement and tonal control.