Jan Gossaert, known as Mabuse (1478-1532) Hercules... Lot 35

Jan Gossaert, known as Mabuse (1478-1532) Hercules and Omphale (or Déjanire). Wood engraving, circa 1520. 172 x 260. Bartsch 3; Hollstein 5. Very fine and rare proof on laid paper (watermark: Gothic P, the paper slightly fractured on one of the letter outlines), trimmed outside the square line, the backgrounds uniformly gray. Two median horizontal folds on verso, with tiny holes visible by transparency only. Small stains and slight traces of oxidized glue on verso. Ex-coll. Friedrich August II (Lugt 971) and mark "D" with other letters stamped on verso (probably indicating a duplicate from his collection, close to L. 780a). The clear presence of the square line indicates an early print: "Early impressions with the complete borderline" (Hollstein, vol. VIII, p. 149). "Hercules and Dejanira, or Omphale, appear in a classical architectural setting, in contrast to that of Le Fratricide [his engraving Cain and Abel]. In the laurel-crowned Hercules, we thought we recognized the features of Charles V." Characteristic of his pictorial work is the complicated interplay of crossed legs, found in his drawing Adam and Eve (Chatsworth), in the Birmingham painting Hercules and Dejanira (1517) and in the Berlin painting Neptune and Amphitrite. (Cf. H. Pauwels, et al, Jean Gossaert dit Mabuse, exhibition catalogue, Musée Boymans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Musée communal Groeninge, Bruges, 1965).