Teatro delle Nobili et Virtuose Donne..., page 5 (recto)

Isabella Catanea Parasole

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Written by Isabella Catanea Parasole, Italian, ca. 1575-ca. 1625, published by Mauritio Bona, Rome. From top to bottom, and left to right: Design composed of 4 horizontal registers that are framed on the left by a vertical column ornamented with an 'S' motif and on the right by a vertical column ornamented with flowers. First register is decorated with a wavy vine of 2 different types of flowers. Second register is decorated striped branches forming a zigzag line that intertwine with a thin curving vine of flowers. Third register is decorated with flowers that have coiling striped stems. Fourth register is decorated with an alternating pattern of a striped branch attached to a 5-petaled flower.

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