Currently not on view
Saint Catherine,
ca. 1620
Attributed to Peter Paul Rubens, 1577–1640; born Siegen, Germany; died Antwerp, Belgium
x1934-531
Printmakers have created scores of engravings and woodcuts that reproduce the work of the great Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens, but only three etchings by the artist himself are known today. Of those, this etching of the Christian saint and martyr Catherine of Alexandria is the only print by Rubens that exists beyond a unique impression. Saint Catherine—formerly venerated by the Catholic Church as the patron saint of education and learning—is traditionally identified by the spike-studded wheel upon which she was said to have been tortured as well as the sword by which she was ultimately beheaded, early in the fourth century.
Information
Title
Saint Catherine
Dates
ca. 1620
Maker
Attributed to Peter Paul Rubens
Medium
Etching
Dimensions
plate (sheet trimmed to plate): 30 × 19.8 cm (11 13/16 × 7 13/16 in.)
frame: 55 × 42 × 3.5 cm (21 5/8 × 16 9/16 × 1 3/8 in.)
Credit Line
Bequest of Junius S. Morgan, Class of 1888
Object Number
x1934-531
Place Made
Europe, Belgium, Antwerp
Inscription
Inscribed in plate, lower left corner: P. Paul Rubens fecit
Signed, verso: [illegible]
Reference Numbers
Wijngaert 595; Hind I; Hollstein I
Materials
Techniques
Subject
- Arthur M. Hind, "Rubens as Etcher," The Print Collector's Quarterly X (February 1923), pp. 62-63
- Frank van den Wijngaert, Inventaris der Rubeniaansche Prentkunst (Antwerp: De Sikkel, 1940), no. 93
-
F.W.H. Hollstein, “van Renesse-van Ryssen,” Dutch and Flemish etchings, engravings, and woodcuts, ca. 1450-1700 (Amsterdam: M. Hertzberger, 1978).
, p. 118
