The Knight and Death, from The Dance of Death
Medium
Etching in black on ivory wove paper
Dimensions
Sheet, trimmed within platemark: 7.1 × 5.2 cm (2 13/16 × 2 1/16 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
109001
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
Hans Holbein’s famous Dance of Death woodcut series of 1538 (augmented in 1545) illustrated the medieval trope of the inescapability of mortality, regardless of one’s social rank or piety. These later etched copies by Hollar (1920.2251 and 1920.2259) capture the flavor of the original, showing a Landsknecht at two customary activities: hoisting his two-handed sword on the battlefield and gambling indoors. The fact that the soldier’s opponent in both cases is Death personified does not bode well ...
About the Artist
Wenceslaus Hollar · 1607–1677
Wenceslaus Hollar (1607-1677) was a prolific Bohemian etcher who became one of the most accomplished printmakers of the seventeenth century. Born in Prague, he trained under Matthäus Merian in Frankfurt before entering the service of Thomas Howard, Earl of Arundel, in 1636. Hollar spent most of his career in England, where he produced approximately 2,740 etchings documenting an extraordinary range...