Titlepage of Neu künstlich Modelbuch (page 1r)
1598 (?)
Medium
Woodcut
Dimensions
Overall: 6 1/8 x 7 7/8 in. (15.5 x 20 cm)
Classification
Books|Prints
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of Mary M. Greenwood, in memory of Eliza Rudd Greenwood, 1953
Accession Number
53.566.1(1r)
Tags
Art Historical Context
This woodcut serves as the title page for *Neu künstlich Modelbuch*, a late-sixteenth-century pattern book published around 1598 by Bernhard Jobin. Created in the medium of woodcut—a technique prized for its ability to produce clear, repeatable images—the page measures just over six by seven inches, making it well suited for inclusion in an affordable printed volume. Jobin, active as a printer and publisher in Strasbourg, contributed to the growing market for instructional books that circulated across Europe. The imagery, tagged with motifs of women at work, reflects the book’s purpose as a p...
About the Artist
Bernhard Jobin · 1535–1597
Bernhard Jobin, born before 1545 in Porrentruy in the Swiss canton of Jura, emerged as a pivotal figure in the Strasbourg printing world. Trained as a Formschneider—a skilled woodblock cutter—he acquired Strasbourg citizenship in 1560 as a typesetter and joined the printers' guild, marking the start of his professional ascent. In 1567, he married Anna Fischart, sister of the renowned writer Johann...