Vladislav Hall, Prague Castle, the Annual Fair
Medium
Engraving in black on two sheets of ivory laid paper, pieced
Dimensions
Left sheet: 56.7 × 61.8 cm (22 3/8 × 24 3/8 in.); right sheet: 57 × 63.7 cm (22 1/2 × 25 1/8 in.)
Classification
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
272157
Art Historical Context
Step into the grandeur of Prague Castle with Aegidius Sadeler II *Vladislav Hall, Prague Castle the Annual Fair* (1607), a monumental engraving that captures the vibrant energy of a Renaissance-era festival. Sadeler, a master Flemish engraver from the Sadeler family, worked at the court of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, Prague was a glittering hub of art, science, and spectacle. This print depicts the soaring Gothic Vladislav Hall—famed for its late-15th-century ribbed vaults and history of coronations—transformed into a bustling marketplace teeming with merchants, revelers, and exotic goods du...
About the Artist
Aegidius Sadeler, II · 1570–1629
Aegidius Sadeler II was born in Antwerp around 1570 into the most distinguished printmaking dynasty of the sixteenth century. The Sadeler family — spanning Jan I, Raphael, and Aegidius I — dominated the European print trade from their Flemish base, and Aegidius II was trained by his uncle Jan Sadeler I, under whom he was listed as a pupil in the records of the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke in 1585. He...