The Calumny of Apelles
1572
Medium
Engraving in black on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image: 40.8 × 55.6 cm (16 1/8 × 21 15/16 in.); Plate/sheet, trimmed slightly within platemark: 42 × 55.7 cm (16 9/16 × 21 15/16 in.)
Classification
engraving
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
131389
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
Cornelis Cort’s engraving recreates a lost painting by the ancient Greek artist Apelles, an allegory of slander known only from a detailed description by the ancient historian Lucian. Renaissance artists including Sandro Botticelli, Andrea Mantegna, Albrecht Dürer, and even Pieter Brueghel produced drawings and paintings based on the historian Lucian’s descriptions in homage to various artists of antiquity. Dürer was even called “the Apelles of the North.” Cort’s engraving includes an illusionis...
About the Artist
Cornelis Cort · 1533–1578
Comment on works: copper engraver; engraver; etcher