The Tribulations of Saint Anthony

c. 1470/1475

Martin Schongauer

Artist, German, c. 1450 - 1491

Printed with fine black lines, crosshatching, and flicks of stippling, a bearded man wearing a long robe is being held up in the sky by nine nightmarish, extremely imaginative creatures in this vertical print. The man is balding and wrinkles line his high forehead. His body faces us, and his arms are pulled down by his sides. He looks down and off to our right with hooded eyes under a furrowed brow. A book hangs from a belt wrapped around his waist, and drapery flutters behind his right arm, to our left. The critters pull on his clothing, arms, legs, and hair. Three raise clubs, ready to strike. Each creature is unique, and they are made of intricate blends of feathers and fur, spikes and scales, snotus and beaks, blunt and sharp teeth, horns, wings, whiskers, flicking tongues, and fins. A bit of a rocky cliff edges into the lower right corner, and the top half of the sky has a loose pattern of horizontal dashes. The artist signed the lower center with his initials, “M + S.”

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    engraving on laid paper

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    sheet (trimmed to plate mark): 31.5 x 23.2 cm (12 3/8 x 9 1/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1943.3.57

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Hollstein, no. 54, State ii/ii

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

(Charles Sessler, Philadelphia); purchased by Lessing J. Rosenwald [1891-1979], 1929; gift to NGA, 1943.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1953

  • Flight, Fantasy, Faith, Fact: A Loan Exhibition Commemorating the Fiftieth Anniversary of Powered Flight, Dayton Art Institute, OH, 1953-1954, no. 102.

1958

  • The Fantastic, the Occult, and the Bizarre in Prints from the Rosenwald Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1958, no catalogue.

1959

  • Engravings of the Master E.S. and Martin Schongauer, University of Kansas Museum, Lawrence, KS, 1959, no. 6.

  • Graphic Art of Durer and Schongauer, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, 1959, no catalogue.

1960

  • Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, 1960, no cat.

1965

  • Drolleries and Demons: Six Centuries of 'Fantastic' Prints, IBM Gallery, New York, NY, 1965, no. 1.

1967

  • Fifteenth Century Engravings of Northern Europe from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., NGA, 1967-1968, no. 37, repro.

  • Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century German Prints, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1967, no catalogue.

1968

  • Good and Bad Angels, University of Notre Dame Art Gallery, IN, 1968, no catalogue.

  • Colorado College, Colorado Springs, CO, 1968-1969, no catalogue.

1971

  • Albrecht Dürer: The Early Graphic Works, Princeton University Art Museum, NJ, 1971, no. 21, repro.

1973

  • Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Prints of Northern Europe from the National Gallery of Art Rosenwald Collection, Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 1973, no. 16, repro.

1987

  • Graphic Survey Show, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., November 1987.

1995

  • Imitation and Invention: Old Master Prints and Their Sources, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1995, as The Temptation of Saint Anthony.

1997

  • Six Centuries/Six Artists, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1997.

2000

  • The Fantastic in Renaissance Prints and Drawings, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2000.

2017

  • Michelangelo Divine Draftsman and Designer, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2017.

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. 37.

2013

  • Parshall, Peter. "Graphic Knowledge: Albrecht Dürer and the Imagination." Art Bulletin 95, no. 3 (September 2013): 396, 397, fig. 3.

2018

  • Porras, Stephanie._ Art of the Northern Renaissance: Courts, Commerce and Devotion_. London: Laurence King Publishing, 2018, p. 100, fig. 53.

Watermarks

Gothic P with flower and cross-stroke (close to Lehrs 64)

Wikidata ID

Q64960252

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