The Pancake Woman
c. 1651
Medium
Etching and engraving on paper
Dimensions
Sheet: 43.6 × 35.5 cm (17 3/16 × 14 in.)
Classification
engraving
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
217919
Art Historical Context
**The Pancake Woman** is a delightful etching and engraving on paper by Dutch artist Cornelis Visscher created around 1651. Measuring 43.6 × 35.5 cm, this print from the Art Institute of Chicago Prints and Drawings department captures a lively everyday scene typical of the Dutch Golden Age Visscher, a printmaker of the 17th century, specialized detailed reproductive engravings that brought paintings to wider audiences through affordable, reproducible art. In the prosperous era of the Dutch Republic, such genre scenes celebrated ordinary life—here, likely a street vendor flipping pancakes amid...
About the Artist
Cornelis Visscher · 1629–1658
Cornelis Visscher (1629–1658) was a Dutch Golden Age engraver, draughtsman, and printmaker born in Haarlem, the brother of fellow artists Jan de Visscher and Lambert Visscher. Little is known of his early life, but he studied under the Haarlem painter and engraver Pieter Claesz Soutman, with whom he closely collaborated from 1649 to 1650, producing numerous portrait engravings for Soutman's print ...