Featured Favourite Printing/Etching in My Wee Collection

I only have four printing/etching/engraving/whatever they're called in my collection and this one is by far my favourite. I bought it when I was still in high school, until this day I think about posting it here.

I believe it's not after any known artwork of the Baptist, but original by the artist whose signature is here:

This is the link to his wiki:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Löwy

 

Would you be kind enough to post a photograph of the text in the opposite corner?

Debora

 

Sure!

 

J. Löwy created the heliograph. PXT is an abbreviation for "He painted it." which means your artist is H. V. Wieser. That's most likely Hyacinth von Wieser (1848-1878) who studied in Rome and appears, from the work below, to have been interested in historical subjects.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliography

Debora

 

Thank you for correcting me! Unfortunately I still cannot find the original painting the etching is based on, but the quality of etching itself is breathtaking

 

It's not terribly unusual to be unable to find an original painting, Not everything is online, and it's possible that the original was just a preparatory drawing for the print. A heliograph is a photographic etching technique. A photo is taken of an artwork, but instead of being printed on paper, the image is transferred to a printing plate treated with a photo-sensitive resist. When processed, the image on the plate can be etched. I think the inventor of the process was Amand Durand. He was certainly an early and prolific practitioner.

It's a nice print.

 

The artist died at 29 in Rome. It's doubtful he left much of a body of work behind nor was well known for his work in his native Austria.

Debora

 

Thank you it does have the texture of a photograph. Not only the original, the print is found only once on a facebook page… feel lucky to have it!

 

and I am careless to leave his name unnoticed there

 

Heiographs are intaglio prints. It's just a question of how the image is realized on the printing plate.

 

It's an interesting treatment of the subject. The artist is showing off a bit what with the foreshortening of the head, the decorated metal tray, the supporting linens. And he's deliberately chosen to avoid gore and, instead, focus on the saint's vulnerability which he emphasizes by the jaunty beard that points heavenward.

Debora

 

It’s surely the finest example I have seen I had it in my bedroom wall for a long time and until one day my mom (non-christian and hardly know any figures apart from Jesus and Mary) realized it’s a head chopped off!

 

I love these comments. Thank you Debora!

During our recent antiquers hiatus, I noticed again that this is the kind of thoughtful, informed commentary that is so hard to find on other sites.

 

A museum catalogue entry for this print, which doesn't tell us a great deal more, except that it must date from before 1898:
https://collections.mfa.org/objects/662829

 

How clever of you to have found the above.

Debora

 

Thank you for searching