The Triumph of Galatea

1592

Hendrick Goltzius after Raphael

Associated Names
Hendrick Goltzius

Artist, Dutch, 1558 - 1617

Raphael

Artist After, Marchigian, 1483 - 1520

This is a print of several people and creatures on the surface of the water. In the center of the print is a person partially draped in flowing cloth, their torso turned to the right and their head looking back to the left. They have long, flowing hair and their hands hold long reins attached to two large fish-like creatures that appear to pull a boat the person stands on. Around this person are several other people in the water, including a person on the far left who is riding a horse and blowing into a conch shell, a man with pointed ears and fin-like legs holding a woman by the waist, another man on the right blowing into what could be a trumpet, and a man with the front legs of a horse and a fish-like tail. In the bottom of the print, a cherub-like figure holds on to one of the fish pulling the central boat. More small, winged cherubs with bows and arrows fly above the scene, their arrows pointed at the central figure. The sky has a few small clouds blowing across it, and the water has small waves. At the bottom of the print are several lines of text.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    engraving on laid paper

  • Credit Line

    The Ahmanson Foundation

  • Dimensions

    plate: 55.7 × 41.8 cm (21 15/16 × 16 7/16 in.)
    sheet: 55.9 × 41.8 cm (22 × 16 7/16 in.)

  • Accession Number

    2015.9.1

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    New Hollstein, no. 334, State i/ii

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

D'Arenberg Collection, Brussels and Westphalila (Lugt 567); (Helmut H. Rumbler, Frankfurt am Main); purchased by NGA, 2015.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

2022

  • The Renaissance in the North: New Prints and Perspectives, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 2022.

Bibliography

1921

  • Hirschmann, Otto. Verzeichnis des graphischen Werks von Hendrick Goltzius (1558-1617) mit Benutzung der durch E.W. Moest hinterlassenen Notizen zusammengestellt. Leipzig: Verlag von Klinkhardt und Biermann, 1921. Reprint. Braunschweig: Klinkhardt &Bie: no. 313, i/ii

1993

  • The New Hollstein Dutch & Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, 1450-1700. (Hendrick Goltzius, Marjolein Leesberg, author). Rotterdam: Sound & Vision Interactive, 1996-, no. 334, i/ii

Inscriptions

in plate, in margin below image: Nerine spumante salo Galatea per undas / Fertur Erythreas fauenti lactea concha. / Cymodice, et Glaucus circum, Tritonqs canorus, / Vectantesque Deam Delphines cerula verrunt. / Doride nata auidos Cyclopis ridet amores, / Dilectunque Acin post funera vivere gaudet. / F. Estius (The fair Galatea sails on a golden shell through the Erythraean Sea, across Nereus's foaming waves. Cymodice and Glaucus are with her, and a Trion blowing a horn. The Dolphins that transport the Goddess skim the surface of the sea. The daughter of Doris laughs at the lustful infatuation of the Cyclops and is glad that her beloved Acis lives again after his death.); in plate, in margin below image: Opus hoc depictum est suis coloribus Romae ad parietem per Raphaëlem D'Urbin, in palatio Augustini Ghigi, et ibidem ab HGolzio adnotatum / et deinde aeri insculptum. Anno 1592. (This work was painted by Raphael of Urbino in his familiar colours on a wall in the palace of Agostino Chigi in Rome and drawn there by H. Goltzius, and subsequently engraved in copper in the year 1592.) [Latin translations from Leeflang, Huigen, and Ger Luijten. Hendrick Goltzius (1558-1617): Drawings, Prints and Paintings. Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum, 2003, p. 139.]; by later hand, lower right verso in graphite: 645

Markings

verso, stamped in blue ink at the lower left: [D'Arenberg Collection, Brussels and Westphalila (Lugt 567)]

Wikidata ID

Q77008442

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