The Lute Player and the Harpist

c. 1495/1503

Israhel van Meckenem

Associated Names
Israhel van Meckenem

Artist, German, c. 1445 - 1503

This print shows two seated individuals playing musical instruments in a detailed interior setting. On the left, a woman in a long gown is playing a harp. She is wearing a tall, pointed hat with cloth hanging down from it, and none of her hair is visible. On the right, a man plays a lute. He wears a shirt with baggy fabric sleeves and tight-fitting pants that end in pointed shoes. An open instrument case sits beside him in the bottom right corner of the print. Behind the two people, columns and arches are visible, with a chandelier hanging from the beams of the ceiling. The print is monochromatic, with black lines on white paper.

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    engraving

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Accession Number

    1952.8.263

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Lehrs, Vol. 9, p.395, no. 505, State i/ii

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

(William Schab, New York); purchased by Lessing J. Rosenwald [1891-1979], 1952; gift to NGA, 1952.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1955

  • installation to accompany two concerts titled "Love Songs of the Renaissance," Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 1955, no cat.

1967

  • Fifteenth Century Engravings of Northern Europe from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., NGA, 1967-1968, no. 239, repro.

Bibliography

1908

  • Lehrs, Max. Geschichte und kritischer Katalog des deutschen, niederlandischen und franzosischen Kupferstichs im XV. Jahrhundert. 9 vols. and 1 plate vol. Vienna: Gesellschaft fur vervielfaltigende Kunst, 1908-1934.

1949

  • Hollstein, F.W.H. et al. German engravings, etchings and woodcuts ca. 1400-1700. 8 vols. Amsterdam: Menno Hertzberger, 1954-1868. Dutch and Flemish etchings, engravings and woodcuts, ca. 1450-1700. Vols. I-XV, XVIII, XIX. Amsterdam: Menno Hertzberge

1967

  • Shestack, Alan. Fifteenth Century Engravings of Northern Europe from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.. Exh. cat. Washington: National Gallery of Art, 1967: no. 239.

1996

  • Hults, Linda C. The Print in the Western World. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1996, 62, fig.1.45, 63.

Wikidata ID

Q65358427

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