Thursday, March 31, 2016

Renaissance Engravings by Agostino Veneziano, 16th century

Agostino Veneziano
 Capital - Doric Column
engraving
1528
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Capital - Ionic Column
engraving
1528
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Capital - Corinthian Column
engraving
1528
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano was an Italian Renaissance printmaker, born in Venice about 1490 and died, probably in Rome, about 1540. He worked with the more famous Marcantonio Raimondi and the school of Raphael until their sophisticated circle was broken up and dispersed by the Sack of Rome in 1527. The prints reproduced here are part of a large and awe-inspiring collection of Veneziano's work at the British Museum.

Agostino Veneziano
Man carrying a column base
engraving
ca. 1515-30
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Apollo & Daphne
engraving
1515
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Nereid riding Triton
engraving
ca. 1510-30
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Satyr carrying Nymph
engraving
ca. 1510-20
British Museum

Agoostino Veneziano
Two terms
engraving
1536
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Prudence & Cupid with mirror
engraving
1516
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Cleopatra
engraving
ca. 1519-30
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Couple
engraving
ca. 1515-30
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Ewer with tall handle
engraving
1531
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Warrior
engraving
ca. 1515-30
British Museum

Agostino Veneziano
Woman with vase
engraving
ca. 1515-30
British Museum

Wednesday, March 30, 2016

Drawings by Hendrik Goltzius (1558-1617)

Hendrik Goltzius
Half-length figure
ca. 1587
drawing on vellum (verso)
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Studies of heads
ca. 1587
drawing on vellum
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius of the Netherlands hoped to be remembered by those who lived after him. With brilliant gifts as a draftsman, he produced many high-quality engravings and woodcuts in an elongated Mannerist style, as seen here yesterday. These earned him a large market of fashionable clients and a substantial European reputation. Most of the drawings reproduced here were made as preparation for such engravings. Then in about 1600 Goltzius switched his emphasis to painting, and did so for the stated reason that painters enjoy a loftier level of posthumous fame than print-makers. Alas, he is remembered today only by specialists – and mainly remembered for those early prints he seemingly disesteemed.

Hendrik Goltzius
Study of head & hands of youth
ca. 1585-92
drawing on vellum
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Sense of Hearing
16th century
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art

Hendrik Goltzius
Sense of Smell
16th century
drawing
Morgan Library, New York

Hendrik Goltzius
Lucretia as Sense of Touch
16th century
drawing
Morgan Library, New York

Hendrik Goltzius
Spring
1594
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art

Hendrik Goltzius
Camel
ca. 1589-90
drawing
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
The Prophet Daniel in a Landscape
16th century
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art

Hendrik Goltzius
Judgment of Midas
1590
drawing
Morgan Library, New York

Hendrik Goltzius
Venus with Bacchus & Ceres
1593
drawing on vellum
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Venus with Bacchus & Ceres
1599
drawing
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Adam & Eve
ca. 1597
drawing
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Fall of Phaeton
16th century
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Hendrik Goltzius at the British Museum

Hendrick Goltzius
Self-portrait
1589
drawing on vellum
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Self-portrait, age 47
1605
drawing on vellum
British Museum

Hendrik Golzius (1558-1617) was an adventurous Dutch artist, printer, and businessman. In 1578 at the age of twenty he set up his own print publishing house in Haarlem. The intention was to challenge Antwerp's traditional monopoly on fine art print publishing in the region. Thanks in large part to the glamour and drama and technical innovation of the engravings and woodcuts Goltzius himself produced, the enterprise succeeded. It must indeed have felt like every young artist's dream come true.

Hendrik Goltzius
Beached Whale
1594
engraving, etching
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Portrait of Gillis van Breen
ca. 1588
chiaroscuro woodcut
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Bacchus
ca. 1588-90
chiaroscuro woodcut
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Mars
ca. 1588-90
chiaroscuro woodcut
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Mars
ca. 1588
chiaroscuro woodcut
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Arcadian landscape
ca. 1612-15
chiaroscuro woodcut
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Sybils (after Polidoro da Caravaggio)
1597
engraving
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Apollo Belvedere
1592
engraving
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Netpune and Amphitrite
ca. 1594
engraving
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Bacchus
16th century
engraving
Metropolitan Museum of Art

Hendrik Goltzius
Portrait of Frederick de Vries
1597
engraving
British Museum

Hendrik Goltzius
Mansucript letter with drawing of an old man 
1606
British Museum

I am grateful for images from the rich Goltzius collection made available by the British Museum.

Monday, March 28, 2016

The Circle of the Carracci at the Ashmolean Museum

Giuseppe Macpherson
Posthumous Portrait of Agostino Carracci
18th century
Royal Collection, Great Britain

Agostino Carracci
Andromeda and the sea monster
ca. 1590-95
engraving
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

English aristocrats of the 19th century collecting Italian art of the 16th century tended to favor "optimistic" attributions. Sooner or later many of these collections were donated or sold to public museums. Curators and other scholars then began the process of undoing many of the hopeful attributions and reassigning works away from some famous name to "follower of" some famous name or "circle of" or "copy after."  At the Ashmolean Museum relatively few of the drawings and prints associated with the Carracci family are still assigned directly to its leading members, Agostino (1557-1602) or Annibale (1560-1609).        

style of Agostino Carracci
Study of a man's head
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

follower of Agostino Carracci
Studies
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Agostino Carracci
Cupid with the sword of Mars
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Agostino Carracci
Omnia vincit Amor
ca. 1590-95
engraving
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Giuseppe Macpherson
Posthumous Portrait of Annibale Carracci
18th century
Royal Collection, Great Britain

Annibale Carracci
Draped boy
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Annibale Carracci
Pastoral landscape
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

copy after Annibale Carracci
Diana & Callisto
drawing
late 16th century
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Annibale Carracci
Figure study, back view
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Annibale Carracci
Draped figure
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Lodovico Carracci
Figure study
late 16th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

attributed to Francesco Carracci
Statue among trees
17th century
drawing
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford