The Great Hercules

Hendrick Goltzius

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This remarkable engraving has long been known as the Knollenman, or bulbous man. It shows Goltzius's bulging-muscle figure style at its most extreme. This Hercules is almost an inflated version of the lithe Apollo of a year earlier (51.501.3). Hercules was frequently associated with the Dutch in their rebellion against Spain, and one interpretation of his odd appearance is that he was meant as an embodiment of the Dutch nation. This astounding piece exemplifies the confidence evident in Goltzius's work of the late 1580s. The deeply cut swelling lines exude bravado, as does the fact that this curious image was printed from a single large and no doubt expensive copper printing plate.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art