New Inventions of Modern Times [Nova Reperta], Amerigo Vespucci Discovering the Southern Cross with an Astrolabium, plate 18

Jan Collaert I

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Eighteenth plate from a print series entitled Nova Reperta (New Inventions of Modern Times) consisting of a title page and 19 plates, engraved by Jan Collaert I, after Jan van der Straet, called Stradanus, and published by Philips Galle. Illustration of Amerigo Vespucci discovering the southern cross in the sky with an astrolabium. Below him is a table with his tools and candle providing light so he can see his work. At the left and right edges of the scene men are sleeping with their hands covering their faces. This scene takes place in a landscape with mountains in the background and an ocean on the right. To the left of the illustration is a text panel with a portrait-medallion of Dante.

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.