Genoa, well known as a seaport established in ancient times and as the birthplace of Christopher Columbus, emerged as a major artistic center toward the middle of the sixteenth century, sparked by the sea lord Andrea Doria's political leadership and ready patronage and the artist Perino del Vaga's arrival from Rome. The technically masterful, even boldly experimental, drawings and prints in this exhibition illustrate Genoa's growth by the early seventeenth century into an important regional artistic school. Some of the drawings were made as independent works of art, as for instance ones by Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione, characterized by rich painterliness and dramatic content. Many sheets are preparatory drawings, which eloquently describe the Genoese tradition of illusionistic fresco painting that unfolded almost in its entirety within the splendid interiors of the new churches and palazzi erected on the Via Balbi and Strada Nuova (now Via Garibaldi). In addition to better-known artists—Luca Cambiaso, Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione, Giovanni Battista Gaulli (Baciccio), Bernardo Strozzi, for example—the exhibition includes less-studied Genoese artists, such as Carlo Alberto Baratta, Giulio Benso, Bartolomeo Biscaino, Bernardo and Valerio Castello, Giovanni David, and Gregorio and Lorenzo de Ferrari, all of whom significantly influenced other artists both in Genoa and elsewhere in Italy.A number of years before his death, Jacob Bean, then Drue Heinz Curator of the Department of Drawings, envisioned an exhibition of drawings and prints selected from New York collections that would highlight the work of Genoese artists between 1530 and 1800. Not only was Jacob very much the conceptual force behind the present exhibition, but he and the late Lawrence Turči&cacute;, then assistant curator, were also noted connoisseurs of Genoese drawings. Their discoveries are attested to by a large, mostly unpublished dossier of attributions to Genoese artists made during the course of more than a decade and kept in the archives of the Department of Drawings and Prints. It is in their memory that this exhibition has been mounted, with works selected by William Griswold, Nadine Orenstein, and Carmen Bambach, the latter two of whom also prepared the catalogue entries. [This book was originally published in 1996 and has gone out of print. This edition is a print-on-demand version of the original book.]

Genoa: Drawings and Prints, 1530–1800

Arts & Photography

Bambach, Carmen C.

Orenstein, Nadine M.

Collections, Catalogs & Exhibitions

Metropolitan Museum of Art

<b>The first comprehensive look at the origins and diffusion across Europe of the etched print during the late 15th and early 16th centuries</b><br><br> The etching of images on metal, originally used as a method for decorating armor, was first employed as a printmaking technique at the end of the 15th century. This in-depth study explores the origins of the etched print, its evolution from decorative technique to fine art, and its spread across Europe in the early Renaissance, leading to the professionalization of the field in the Netherlands in the 1550s. Beautifully illustrated, this book features the work of familiar Renaissance artists, including Albrecht Dürer, Jan Gossart, Pieter Breughel the Elder, and Parmigianino, as well as lesser known practitioners, such as Daniel Hopfer and Lucas van Leyden, whose pioneering work paved the way for later printmakers like Rembrandt and Goya. The book also includes a clear and fascinating description of the etching process, as well as an investigation of how the medium allowed artists to create highly detailed prints that were more durable than engravings and more delicate than woodblocks.

The Renaissance of Etching

Jenkins, Catherine

Spira, Freyda

History & Criticism

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Books by Orenstein, Nadine M.