Hendrick Goltzius
(Netherlands 1558–1617)
- Title
- Persephone
- Other titles:
- Proserpine
- Year
- circa 1594
- Media category
- Materials used
- chiaroscuro woodcut
- Dimensions
-
34.7 x 26.2cm image (oval); 39.4 x 29.0cm sheet (irreg.)
- Signature & date
- Not signed. Not dated.
- Credit
- Purchased 1983
- Accession number
- 229.1983
- Location
- Not on display
- Further information
Following his journey to Italy in 1590-91 Goltzius started making chiaroscuro woodcuts in the tradition of such Italians as Ugo da Carpi and Andrea Andreani, introducing this technique to the northern Netherlands. This print of Persephone (Proserpine) is one of a series of deities executed in woodcut about 1594, all of them corresponding in size and format. Persephone was the daughter of Zeus and Demeter. While gathering flowers on a hillside in Sicily she was kidnapped by Pluto and taken down to the underworld to be his wife.
- Bibliography (2)
-
Ewen McDonald (Australia) (Editor), The Art Gallery of New South Wales collections, Sydney, 1994, 113 (colour illus.).
Nicholas Draffin (Australia, b.1943, d.1995) (Author), Piety and Paganism, Sydney, 1991, 4, cover (colour illus.), 15.
- Exhibition history (2)
-
Piety and Paganism, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 13 Jul 1991–29 Sep 1991.
Old Europe: Prints & drawings from the collection 1500-1800, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 03 Jun 2006–06 Aug 2006.
