Lamentation for Christ
Medium
Woodcut; first of two states
Dimensions
Block: 8 11/16 × 6 1/8 in. (22.1 × 15.5 cm) Sheet: 9 1/16 × 6 5/16 in. (23 × 16 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of Felix M. Warburg, 1920
Accession Number
20.64.22
Tags
Art Historical Context
Hans Baldung, known as Hans Baldung Grien, created this poignant woodcut in 1510 during the height of the Northern Renaissance. The scene captures the Lamentation over the dead Christ, with a group of grieving women surrounding his body in a moment of profound sorrow. As the first of two states, the print reveals the artist’s careful attention to expressive line work and emotional intensity, hallmarks of his distinctive approach influenced by his close association with Albrecht Dürer. Woodcuts like this one played a vital role in early sixteenth-century Germany, allowing religious imagery to ...
About the Artist
Hans Baldung (called Hans Baldung Grien) · 1484–1545
Hans Baldung Grien (1484/85–1545), born in Schwäbisch Gmünd into an erudite family of jurists and physicians, forsook academia to pursue art. His early training around 1500 took place in the Upper Rhineland, likely Strasbourg, before he apprenticed under Albrecht Dürer in Nuremberg from 1503 to 1507. There, the young artist honed his skills in painting, printmaking, and stained glass, even managin...