Samson and Delilah

Samson and Delilah

Albrecht Altdorfer

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Within a landscape setting, Samson lies asleep with his head upon Delilah's lap while she, holding the scissors with which she will cut his hair and deprive him of his strength, gestures towards the soldiers in the background who wait to arrest him (Judges 13:16). This autonomous drawing on colored ground is one of four by Altdorfer dated 1506. The fine pen work is characteristic of his early drawings. This drawing is annotated with an unusual, Italianate form of Altdorfer's name, also seen on two other drawings of early date, "Witches Sabbath" and "Allegory with Pax and Minerva," both of which show the influence of Mantegna's designs. This Italianism has been taken as evidence for a trip to Italy, though no such trip is documented.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.