from The Set of The Bears

Art Historical Context

This delicate etching, *from The Set of The*, attributed to Marcus de Bye or Gheeraerts the Elder dated around 1664, captures the intriguing subject of bears in a compact sheet measuring just 4½ x 5¾ inches. Housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Drawings and Prints department, it entered the collection through the generous bequest of Phyllis Massar in 1. As part of a thematic series, it reflects the 17th-century fascination with animal imagery in Northern European printmaking, where such works served both decorative purposes and as studies of the natural world. Etching, the medium here, ...