Ignorance Defeated
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
Sheet (trimmed): 12 3/16 × 16 15/16 in. (31 × 43 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1944
Accession Number
44.104.1
Tags
Art Historical Context
Created around 1540–45, *Ignorance Defeated* is an etching that captures the inventive spirit of the Fontainebleau court in France. Rosso Fiorentino, an Italian Mannerist painter, supplied the original design while Antonio Fantuzzi translated it into print. The medium of etching, still relatively new at the time, allowed courtly imagery to circulate beyond the palace walls, reaching scholars, collectors, and artists across Europe. The composition presents an energetic crowd of men and women, embodying the allegorical triumph of knowledge over ignorance—a theme favored by Renaissance humanists...