id: 162394 accession number: 2002.9 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/2002.9 updated: 2023-08-23 23:57:21.722000 Saint Peter, c. 1547. Domenico Beccafumi (Italian, 1486–1551). Chiaroscuro woodcut printed in four shades of brown; sheet: 41.2 x 21.4 cm (16 1/4 x 8 7/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund 2002.9 title: Saint Peter title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: c. 1547 creation date earliest: 1542 creation date latest: 1552 current location: creditline: Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund copyright: --- culture: Italy, 16th century technique: chiaroscuro woodcut printed in four shades of brown department: Prints collection: PR - Chiaroscuro type: Print find spot: catalogue raisonne: Bartsch vol XII, p. 71, no. 14; Passavant vol. VI, pp.150-1, no. 5 --- CREATORS * Domenico Beccafumi (Italian, 1486–1551) - artist Domenico di Giacomo Pace (also known as Mecarino, 1484/86-1551) was a Sienese Mannerist painter, sculptor, draughtsman, printmaker, and illuminator. At an early age, he took the name Beccafumi from his protector Lorenzo. Beccafumi was perhaps the most original artistic personality of the sixteenth-century Siena. There, he spent the most part of his career, with brief sojourns in Rome (1510-12), Genoa (ca. 1533), and Pisa (1536-38). In Siena, he obtained the most prestigious public commissions, such as the fresco decoration in Palazzo Pubblico, and the design of inlaid marble pavements and the creation of bronze sculptures in the Siena Cathedral. Beccafumi's drawings and prints are both stylistically characterized by vibrant compositions and dramatic effects of light. --- measurements: Sheet: 41.2 x 21.4 cm (16 1/4 x 8 7/16 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: description: laid paper, lined overall with heavy wove paper watermarks: inscriptions: inscription: Watermark: Flowering Fleur de Lys in a Circle Surmonted by a Star translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Against the Grain: Woodcuts from the Collection opening date: 2003-08-17T00:00:00 Against the Grain: Woodcuts from the Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 17-November 9, 2003). title: The Chiaroscuro Woodcut in Renaissance Italy opening date: 2018-06-03T04:00:00 The Chiaroscuro Woodcut in Renaissance Italy. Los Angeles County Museum of Art (organizer) (June 3-September 16, 2018); National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (October 14, 2018-January 20, 2019). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS --- PROVENANCE --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: Beccafumi was an important and extremely versatile Sienese artist––a painter of altarpieces, frescoes, and furniture, a sculptor in wood, stucco, and bronze, and a designer of a large portion of the inlaid marble floor in the Siena Cathedral. He was also one of the most imaginative, daring, and versatile printmakers of the Italian Renaissance. Although his first prints were engravings, in order to reproduce the rich, tonal effects of his drawings, Beccafumi began to make chiaroscuro woodcuts. Around 1547, he completed a series of six chiaroscuros of the apostles, including Saint Peter. These are the artist's most skillful, complex, and successful prints, and among the most extraordinary color prints in 16th-century Italy. The blocks were carved and printed in an innovative manner. In order to attain the brilliant highlights common in his chiaroscuro drawings, Beccafumi created the effect of thin white hatching lines on a dark ground. He also treated each impression as a separate work of art. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Takahatake, Naoko, et al. The Chiaroscuro Woodcut in Renaissance Italy. Los Angeles : Los Angeles County Museum of Art ; Munich ; New York : DelMonico Books/Prestel, 2018. page number: Reproduced and mentioned: pp. 179-183. url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.9/2002.9_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.9/2002.9_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/2002.9/2002.9_full.tif