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Description: | bound volume (dimensions 54 x 38 x 7 cms) inscr. on plate b.c. "Sancta Maria Magdalena"; inscr. on plate b.l. "C. Smith pinx:"; inscr. on plate b.r. "I. Smith fec: & excud:"; inscr. on page t.r. hand-written in brown ink "21" CRE SMITH, John; (English; 1652-1743) PUB SMITH, John; (English; 1652-1743) AFTER SMITZ, G; (?; c. 1635-1707) Part of William Hunter's original bequest, this is one of three volumes which together contain 488 mezzotints, almost all made or published by John Smith. About two thirds are portraits of eminent late Stuart, early Hanoverian persons. The remaining third are subject prints after a wide range of artists and subjects, from mythological and religious scenes after old Italian and Dutch and Flemish masters such as Titian and Rubens to fancy subjects after contemporary French and English painters.
Instrumental in raising the standard of mezzotint portraits, Smith was the first British printmaker to gain a European reputation, and examples of his work were essential for any serious first half of the 18th century European print collection. Hunter's set of volumes is a rare surviving example of a comprehensive collection of mezzotints compiled in the 1730s.
This is one of several depictions of Mary Magdalene in the volume (see also Glaha 16623, 16627) a subject which became particularly popular in 17th century Italian art created to reaffirm Catholic values. She is shown with her traditional attribute a skull representing the contemplative life. The print is after a painting by Gaspar Smitz, a contemporary Dutch painter working in England whose reputation for painting Mary Magdalene was noted by Horace Walpole in his "Anecdotes of Painting in England". | License: | http://www.hmag.gla.ac.uk/spirit/rights/ | Publisher: | Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery, University of Glasgow | Rights holder: | Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery, University of Glasgow | Subjects: | SAINT : SAINT MARY MAGDALENE : BIBLE : NEW TESTAMENT : CAVE : TOMB : PRAYER : HALO : SKULL : PENITENT SAINT : REPENTANCE : JAR : HUNTER VOLUME : | Source: | Hunterian Museum | Creator: | Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery, University of Glasgow | Identifier: | http://www.huntsearch.gla.ac.uk/cgi-bin/... | Language: | en-GB | Go to resource |
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