October, from The Twelve Months of the Year
Medium
Etching on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Plate: 15.9 × 30.1 cm (6 5/16 × 11 7/8 in.); sheet: 17.2 × 31 cm (6 13/16 × 12 1/4 in.)
Classification
etching
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
268655
Art Historical Context
Step into the crisp autumn air of 17th-century Holland with *October*, a delicate etching by Jan van de Velde II from his enchanting series *The Twelve Months the Year* (1616). As a master of the Dutch Golden Age, van de Velde captured the rhythms of rural life through finely wrought prints like this one, evoking the turning seasons and everyday labors of peasants. Produced during a time when the Netherlands was blossoming as a hub of artistic innovation, this work reflects the era's growing fascination with landscape and genre scenes, bridging the gap between Renaissance precision and the eme...
About the Artist
Jan van de Velde, II · 1593–1641
Jan van de Velde II (1593–1641) was a Dutch Golden Age printmaker and engraver whose work represents one of the high points of early seventeenth-century Dutch graphic art. Son of the calligrapher Jan van de Velde I, he was born in Delft and trained as an engraver, likely under or in close contact with the Haarlem printmaking tradition that was producing some of the most ambitious graphic work in E...