Arts, Letters, and Power
Van Dyck and the Portrait Print
Van Dyck and the Portrait Print
Soon after his return from Italy to his native Flanders in 1627, the famed portraitist Anthony van Dyck began a series of etchings depicting the illustrious people of his day. Beginning with 15 etchings by his own hand, van Dyck provided the designs for what became more than 180 prints of painters, musicians, humanists, and international rulers. Centered on the Netherlands and Flanders, but including sitters from as far away as Spain and Austria, the series constitutes a panorama of educated society in the 17th century and set a new precedent for portrait printmaking. In this exhibition of 60 prints, sitters as varied as the Spanish regent Archduchess Isabella Clara Eugenia, the Bohemian general Albrecht von Wallenstein, the arts patron Nicholas Rockox, and van Dyck’s friend and fellow artist Frans Snyders embody the lives and intrigues of European courts.