Saint Thomas

Master FVB

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This compelling portrayal was created by one of the outstanding printmakers active in the Netherlands during the last quarter of the fifteenth century. Master FVB's realistic rendering and psychologically penetrating depiction of subjects, supremely evident in this introspective saint gazing off in contemplation, distinguish his work from that of his Late Gothic contemporaries. The artist's actual identity remains unknown; the name bestowed upon him by scholars derives from the monogram he engraved at the bottom of his prints. The apostle Thomas, patron saint of builders and architects, holds his identifying attribute, an architect's square. His association with architects arose from a fourth-century apocryphal romance, the Acts of Thomas, in which Thomas was ordered to design and build a palace for an Indian king. Thomas converted the king's subjects to Christianity and ultimately converted the king himself.

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