G1098: Melencolia I
Prints1999.230.7
Flower Vase in the Form of an Archaic Bronze 'Zun' Wine Vessel with Dragon-and-Wave Decor
1919.204
Small Circular Bowl with Crane, Cloud, and Floral Decor
A female figure looks up and out to the left. She’s surrounded by hanging scales, an hourglass, and bell above, building tools at the bottom, a blank globe in the lower left, polyhedron form in front of her. She’s wearing a laurel crown and has many keys hanging off her waist. A skinny dog curls up by her feet looking down, and a small clothed winged baby with bare feet sits on a stone wheel to her right, holding a book in its lap. An ocean horizon is in the background with rainbow and sunbeams.
Identification and Creation
- Object Number
- G1098
- People
-
Albrecht Dürer, German (Nuremberg 1471 - 1528 Nuremberg)
- Title
- Melencolia I
- Classification
- Prints
- Work Type
- Date
- 1514
- Culture
- German
- Persistent Link
- https://hvrd.art/o/273681
Physical Descriptions
- Medium
- Engraving printed in black ink on white antique laid paper
- Technique
- Engraving
- Dimensions
-
sheet: 23.9 x 18.5 cm (9 7/16 x 7 5/16 in.)
- Inscriptions and Marks
-
- inscription: title engravied on the outstretched wings of the bat at upper left: MELENCOLIA I
- inscription: magic square engraved at upper right: [magic square with numbers adding up 34 in all directions, the date 1514 at center bottom]
- inscription: at right, on the step on which the figure is seated, engraved artist's monogram and date printed in black ink: 1514 / AD
- collector's mark: verso, purple stamp with accession number written within in brown ink: GRAY COLLECTION, / 1098 / HARVARD COLLEGE. [within an oval borderline (Lugt 4836)]
- inscription: verso, graphite: 64
Provenance
- Recorded Ownership History
- Francis Calley Gray, bequest; to William Gray, his nephew, 1856, gift; to Harvard University, 1857
State, Edition, Standard Reference Number
- State
- Meder iia/iii
- Standard Reference Number
- Hollstein 75; Bartsch 74, Meder 75, Strauss 79
Acquisition and Rights
- Credit Line
- Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of William Gray from the collection of Francis Calley Gray
- Object Number
- G1098
- Division
- European and American Art
- Contact
- am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
- Permissions
-
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Publication History
- Sarah Vure, The John Witt Randall Collection: Seeking the True and the Beautiful, brochure, Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 1998), p. 3, fig. 2
- Nicholas Baume, Getting Emotional, exh. cat., Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston (Boston, 2005), p. 22, repro.
- Susan Dackerman, ed., Prints and the Pursuit of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe, exh. cat., Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 2011), cat. 91 p.366-367, repr.
- H. Harvard Arnason and Elizabeth Mansfield, History of Modern Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Photography, Pearson Education, Inc. (Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2013), repr. as fig. 2.47 on p.41
Exhibition History
- Re-View: S426A (Large Niche) HAA252k The Age of Durer, Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, 11/13/2008 - 02/06/2009
- Prints and the Pursuit of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 09/06/2011 - 12/10/2011; Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Evanston, 01/17/2012 - 04/08/2012
- A Colloquium in the Visual Arts, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 08/27/2022 - 12/30/2022
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Verification Level
This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu