Saint Jerome in His Study

Saint Jerome in His Study

Albrecht Dürer

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Of Dürer's three technically brilliant Meisterstiche (master engravings) of 1513 and 1514, this is the one whose interpretation seems the most straightforward. Saint Jerome, translator of the Bible into Latin (the Vulgate) and thus the exemplar of the Christian scholar, is seated in a typical study of Dürer's day. He works peacefully at a slanted writing table, and his lion and dog slumber equally peacefully in the foreground. The light of his halo and the sunlight pouring in through the windows are in perfect equilibrium, and recurrent horizontals in the composition add to the pervasive sense of repose and harmony.

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.