Portrait of Jean-Philotée Achillini: seated man playing guitar on hill near tree, landscape with small town in background
ca. 1500–1534
Medium
Engraving; only state
Dimensions
Sheet: 7 5/16 × 5 1/4 in. (18.5 × 13.4 cm)
Classification
Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1925
Accession Number
25.2.26
Art Historical Context
This enchanting engraving, *Portrait of Jean-Philée Achillini*, a seated man strumming a guitar atop a gentle hill, framed by a solitary tree and a distant town nestled in a serene landscape. Created around 1500–1534 by the masterful engraver Marcantonio Raimondi after a design by Francesco Francia, it the collaborative spirit of Renaissance printmaking. Francia, a leading Bolognese painter influenced by Perugino and Raphael, provided the graceful composition, while Raimondicelebrated for his precise burin work—translated it into this sole surviving state on a modest 7 5/16 × 5 1/4-inch sheet....
About the Artist
Marcantonio Raimondi|Francesco Francia · 1475–1534
Marcantonio Raimondi (c. 1480–1534), born near Bologna, Italy, emerged as one of the Renaissance's premier engravers, revolutionizing printmaking through his mastery of reproductive techniques. He trained in the workshop of the goldsmith, painter, and niellist Francesco Francia, whose influence is evident in his early engravings, such as the goldsmith-like shading in *Pyramus and Thisbe* (1505), h...