Plate One, from The Wise and Foolish Virgins, plate One
1635
Medium
Engraving and etching on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image: 25.8 × 32.2 cm (10 3/16 × 12 11/16 in.); Sheet: 33 × 43.2 cm (13 × 17 1/16 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
26674
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
This etching offers a modernized take on Christ’s parable of the ten wise and foolish virgins who awaited the arrival of a bridegroom to his wedding. Here the five wise virgins have saved the oil for their lamps, for which they will be rewarded by being invited to the wedding. Abraham Bosse reinforced the social value of such bourgeois domesticity through symbolic spatial construction. The ideally spiritual and literate young women discuss religious tomes but blend into the ornamental wall tapes...
About the Artist
Abraham Bosse · 1602–1676
Abraham Bosse (1604–1676) was a French printmaker and theorist whose approximately 1,600 etchings provide an unparalleled visual record of 17th-century French life. Born to Huguenot parents in Tours, he trained in Paris under Melchior Tavernier and became a devoted follower of Jacques Callot's technical innovations. Bosse's meticulous etchings depicted subjects ranging from daily life and fashion ...