Lucidario di Recami, page 3 (recto)

Iseppo Foresto

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Designed by Iseppo Foresto, published by Jeronimo Calepino, 1564. From top to bottom, and left to right: Design composed of 4 vertical columns printed upon a grid. First column is decorated with an intertwining vine of leaves with a 4-petaled flower at the center. Second column is decorated in the center with an urn, flanked on both sides by a curving vine of leaves. Third column is decorated with a flower in the center with stems that curve outward. Fourth column is decorated with a central flower that is surrounded by curving vines with leaves, upon which sit 2 devil figures at the top.

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