After Holbein

Media: photography

Number of images: 49

15 selected images shown

Print size: 20x24 inches

Execution: 2014

Photographs based on Hans Holbein's Dance of Death charting their evolution from drawing to woodcut, book to photograph.

Chronology

In 1497, Hans Holbein (the Younger) is born in Augsburg, Bavaria, to a family of artists which includes his grandfather, father and brother.

c.1522-1526, Holbein draws the works which come to be known as the "Dance of Death".

c.1522-1526, Hans Lutzelburger carves the woodcuts from Holbein's drawings. There is no further record of the drawings and they are assumed to have been lost or destroyed. Lutzelburger dies in 1526.

(Per William M. Ivans, Jr., late Curator of Prints, Metropolitan Museum of Art: "There is strong reason to think that Durer himself cut some of his earlier blocks, though many of the later ones were cut by professionals, some of whom are known to us by name.")[1]

c.1524-1526, 40 woodcuts are distributed (in unknown quantities) with a descriptive title printed in German above each image. When sold, they become wildly popular as they are visual critiques of the ruling class in the midst of the German Peasants' War, a failed uprising resulting in the loss of life estimated between 100,000 to 300,000 peasant lives.

In 1538, Melchior and Trechsel publish the woodcuts in book form. There are now 41 woodcuts, all are believed to be by Lutzelburger. The book is printed in French; a biblical quote replaces the German title above each image; and a four line poem by Gilles Corozet is printed below. The book is titled: "Les Simulachres & historiees faces de la Mort, autant elegamment pourtraictes, que artificiellement imaginées".

In 1543, Holbein dies of the plague in London.

In 1545, a new edition is printed adding 8 new woodcuts. The works now number 49. The authenticity of these new woodcuts based on drawings by Holbein are suspect and or considered spurious by scholars.

c.1830-33, Francis Douce hires George Wilmot Bonner and John Byfield to make new woodcuts based on the 49 printed in 1545.

in 1833, Douce publishes these in: "The Dance of Death exhibited in elegant engravings on wood with a dissertation on the several representations of that subject but more particularly on those ascribed to Macaber and Hans Holbein".

In 1858, 24 years after Douces's death, his book is republished by Henry G. Bohn, in London with an introduction by Thomas Frognall Dibdin.

In 2014, Douces's 1858 posthumous book, along with a vertebrae bone from an unknown animal are used to make the photographs.

[1] William M. Ivins, Jr., Prints and Visual Communication, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Third printing, 1978, p. 46
A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #1

fter Holbein Photograph. Photographs based on Hans Holbein (the Younger) engravings.

After Holbein #2

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #4

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #23

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #30

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #31

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #32

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #33

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #38

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #41

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #42

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #44

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #45

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #46

A photograph based on Hans Holbein engraving from the Dance of Death c.1522-1526

After Holbein #47