Venus removing a thorn from her left foot while seated beside trees and foliage, a hare eating grass before her
Original title: Venus removing a thorn from her left foot while seated beside trees and foliage, a hare eating grass before her
kurzbeschreibung
Venus sits on a rock, lifting her left foot to pull a thorn from it. A hare grazes in the grass before her, and behind them a landscape opens up with a bridge and scattered buildings. Marco Dente engraved the print in black and white around 1515–27.
Description
Crouched on the rock, Venus has raised her left foot to work the thorn loose. Beside her a hare feeds on the grass. Trees and ferns frame the figure and draw the eye into the distance, where a bridge and a few buildings can be made out. The layout is clearly ordered, with the careful attention to detail typical of the Renaissance.
Context
The Italian engraver Marco Dente worked in Rome in the first half of the sixteenth century, following works by Raphael and classical models. The motif of Venus removing a thorn from her foot was known in antiquity and often taken up again in the Renaissance. The date of origin cannot be fixed precisely; it falls between 1515 and 1527.
Impact
The print comes across as calm and balanced, and the gaze is clearly directed at Venus. The dense, precise lines of the engraving give the subject a richly detailed feel. Because only one colour was used, light and dark stand out strongly and create a sense of volume.
Technique
For printing, a copper plate was incised with fine lines and then printed. Dente used tight, close hatching to work out light and shadow. The impressions were pulled in single-colour ink on paper, which produces the characteristic black-and-white effect.
AI-generated description text
Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art · Public Domain (CC0 1.0)