Inscription
Insects in image numbered .1., .2., .3., .4., 5., and .6., in red ink; center right in brown ink: XXXIII.
Facing page:
Upper center in red ink: Homo sicut FLOS egreditur, et conteritur, et fugit / velut umbra, et nu[m]quam in eodem statu permanet. Job 14. (“Who comes forth like a flower and is destroyed and flees as a shadow and never continues in the same state.” Job 14:2) (Latin Vulgate Bible)
Provenance
Emperor Rudolf II of Austria?[1]; Secretarius Heinrich Hagen, Vienna, 1611.[2] Count Emanuel Maria Joseph von Arco, Munich, 1751.[3] Graf von Seinsheim, canon of Salzburg and Speyer, 1753. Master stonemason Rüpfel, Munich, c. 1830. Joseph Anton Niggl [1792 - 1842], Markt Tölz. Karl August von Brentano [1817 - 1896], Augsburg. (sale, Rudolph Weigel, 28 October 1861, no. 2220-a-d]; (Frederick Startridge Ellis [active 1860 - 1885], London; formerly identified as F. S. Eliot)[3]; Henry Huth [1815 - 1878], London; by descent to his son, Alfred Henry Huth [1850 - 1910], London; (sale, Sotheby's' London, 12 June 1913, no. 3722); (William Wesley & Son, London); Charles Francis George Richard Schwerdt, Old Alresford House, Hampshire (his sale, Sotheby's' London, 15 July 1946, no. 2216); (The Rosenbach Company, Philadelphia); Lessing J. Rosenwald, Jenkintown; given to Edith Goodkind Rosenwald, Jenkintown; gift to NGA, 1987.
[1] Although Van Mander claims the series was commissioned and purchased by Rudolf, this is impossible as dates scattered throughout volumes pre-date Hoefnagel's' contact with Rudolf. The series does not appear in Rudolf's' inventory, though he is likely to have owned it at one time as many copies from the volumes appear in his natural history collections, now in Vienna (see Bass 2020, 12).
[2] Vignau-Wilberg 2017, 98 without documentation.
[3]Wolfgang Wegner, Kurfurst Carl Theodor von der Pfalz als Kunstsammler, Mannheim, 1960: 13.
[4] Ellis was a book dealer who frequently sold to Huth and wrote the catalogue of Huth's' collection. He started his own business just a year before The Four Elements appeared at Weigel. Ellis is correctly identified by M. Bartels, "Ueber abnorme Behaarung beim Menschen," Zeitschrift fu¨r Ethnologie 11 (1879): 155, note 1.
Exhibition History
- 1982
- Drawings from the Holy Roman Empire, = 1540 - 1680, The Art Museum, Princeton University, National Gallery of Art, Museum of Art, Carnegie Insitute, Pittsburgh (exh. cat. by Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann, no. 56.
- 1982
- Drawings from the Holy Roman Empire, 1540 - 1680, The Art Museum, Princeton University, National Gallery of Art, Museum of Art, Carnegie Insitute, Pittsburgh (exh. cat. by Thomas DaCosta Kaufmann, no. 56.
- 1998
- A Collector's Cabinet, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1998, no. 76.
- 1999
- From Botany to Bouquets: Flowers in Northern Art, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1999, no. 45, as Iris from Animalia Rationalia et Insecta (Ignis).
- 2002
- Deceptions and Illusions: Five Centuries of Trompe l'Oeil Painting, National Gallery of Art, Washington, 2002-2003, no. 30, as Ignis (Animalia Rationalia et Insecta) Plate 47.
Bibliography
- 1984
- Hendrix, Lee. Joris Hoefnagel and the Four Elements: a Study in Sixteenth-Century Nature Painting. Ph.D. Hendrix, Lee. Joris Hoefnagel and the Four Elements: a Study in Sixteenth-Century Nature Painting. Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton University, 1984 (series).dissertation, Princeton University, 1984 (series).
- 2017
- Vignau-Wilberg, Thea. Joris and Jacob Hoefnagel: Art and Science around 1600. Berlin, 2017: no. A6 (for series).
- 2019
- Bass, Marisa Ann. Insect Artifice: Nature and Art in the Dutch Revolt. Princeton, 2019 (for series).
Related Content
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- Results layout:
Associated Records
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- Animalia Rationalia et Insecta (Ignis)
- 1987.20.5
-
- Title Page
- 1987.20.5.1
-
- Plate 19: Two Butterflies with Five Other Insects
- 1987.20.5.20
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- Plate 24: Pink Rose
- 1987.20.5.25
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- Plate 25: Blue Underwing Moth and Spurge Hawk Moth
- 1987.20.5.26
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- Plate 26: Two Hawk Moths
- 1987.20.5.27
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- Plate 29: Pink Rose and Rosebud
- 1987.20.5.30
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- Plate 30: Seven Moths
- 1987.20.5.31
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- Plate 31: Seven Moths
- 1987.20.5.32
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- Plate 32: Six Moths
- 1987.20.5.33
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- Plate 35: A Wolf Spider(?) and Three Other Spiders
- 1987.20.5.36
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- Plate 36: Three Large Spiders and One Small Spider
- 1987.20.5.37
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- Plate 37: Seven Spiders and an Insect
- 1987.20.5.38
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- Plate 38: Seven Spiders
- 1987.20.5.39
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- Plate 3: Empty Oval
- 1987.20.5.4
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- Plate 39: Eight Spiders
- 1987.20.5.40
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- Plate 41: Yellow Spider Surrounded by Eight Spiders
- 1987.20.5.42
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- Plate 44: Mantis, Mayfly, and a Fictional Locust
- 1987.20.5.45
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- Plate 45: Two Long-Headed Grasshoppers(?)
- 1987.20.5.46
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- Plate 46: Three Grasshoppers
- 1987.20.5.47
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- Plate 4: Empty Oval
- 1987.20.5.5
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- Plate 52: Four Grasshoppers
- 1987.20.5.53
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- Plate 53: Southern Hawker Dragonfly
- 1987.20.5.54
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- Plate 54: Hairy Dragonfly and Two Darters
- 1987.20.5.55
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- Plate 56: A Rosebud and a Disintegrating Pink Rose
- 1987.20.5.57
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- Plate 57: A Ladybug, a Fly, and Four Other Insects
- 1987.20.5.58
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- Plate 58: A Bee and Five Other Insects
- 1987.20.5.59
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- Plate 5: Stag Beetle
- 1987.20.5.6
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- Plate 60: Flies and Other Insects
- 1987.20.5.61
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- Plate 61: Seven Insects, Including Flies
- 1987.20.5.62
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- Plate 62: Ten Insects
- 1987.20.5.63
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- Plate 68: Seven Bees and Flies
- 1987.20.5.69
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- Plate 69: Nine Bees and Other Insects
- 1987.20.5.70
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- Plate 70: A Roach Surrounded by Insects
- 1987.20.5.71
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- Plate 71: Two Wasps and a Pill Bug
- 1987.20.5.72
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- Plate 73: Ten Insects
- 1987.20.5.74
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- Plate 74: Insects with White Daffodils
- 1987.20.5.75
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- Plate 75: A Fly and Other Insects with an Iris
- 1987.20.5.76
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- Plate 76: Insects with a Pink and Cream Columbine
- 1987.20.5.77
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- Plate 78: Ten Insects, Including a Blue Fly
- 1987.20.5.79
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- Plate 7: Swallowtail Butterfly
- 1987.20.5.8
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- Plate 79: Twelve Insects, Including Shield Bugs
- 1987.20.5.80
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- Plate 80: Purple and Yellow Viola
- 1987.20.5.81