Plate 9: a cartouche with the head of a ram at top center, flowers at top left and right, from 'Twelve cartouches' (Recueil de douze cartouches)
Medium
Etching; second state of four
Dimensions
Sheet (Trimmed): 3 1/4 × 2 11/16 in. (8.2 × 6.9 cm)
Classification
Prints|Ornament & Architecture
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Bequest of Phyllis Massar, 2011
Accession Number
2012.136.392.9
Tags
Art Historical Context
Welcome to Plate 9 from *Twelve Cartouches* (*Recueil de douze cartouches*), a delightful etching created around 1640–45 by the Italian master printmaker Stefano della Bella collaboration with French publishers François Langlois and Collignon. This second state of four captures an elegant cartouche—a decorative frame popular in 17th-century Europe—featuring a majestic ram's head crowning the top center, by blooming flowers on the left and right. Trimmed to a petite 3¼ × 2⅝ inches, it's a gem from the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Drawings and Prints collection, bequeathed by Phyllis Massar in 2...