David praying

Born in the city of Leiden, Lucas van Leyden was the first Dutch engraver to achieve wide acclaim in his lifetime. He made about 200 prints, mostly engravings, but also woodcuts and a few etchings. He met Albrecht Dürer in 1521 during the German artist's year-long visit to the Netherlands, and Dürer drew van Leyden's portraits and bought a set of his prints. It is likely that van Leyden simultanously acquired some of Dürer's prints, as his influence is evident in van Leyden's work in the early 1520s.

This print, usually dated as 1507, was evidently made when Lucas was just 13. Like the related David playing the harp before Saul (1508), it reveals him as a remarkable prodigy. There are no traces of immaturity or clumsiness, and the foreshortening of David's heavenly inclined head, emphasising his fervour and piety, is particularly impressive; the same can be said for his drapery folds, and indeed the perspectival setting with the backdrop of a fortified city.

Van Leyden shows David out of doors, next to his palace and in direct contact with the tiny figure at top right of God the Father, brandishing an arrow of punishment from the clouds above. This scene has been interpreted as the last narrative moment of this Old Testament king, his solitary prayer on behalf of his people, who are being punished on his account with plague, traditionally symbolised by arrows from God. This print was almost certainly known to Rembrandt, van Leyden's compatriot, just over a century later. Although the interior setting of Rembrandt's etching David in Prayer (1652) is very different, he would have admired the powerful humility of van Leyden's figure.

See:

David Maskill, 'Lucas van Leyden 1494-1533 Netherlands', in Art at Te Papa, edited by William McAloon (Wellington, 2009), p. 26.

Shelley Perlove and Larry Silver, Rembrandt's Faith: Church and Temple in the Dutch Golden Age (University Park, Penn., 2009), p. 125.

Dr Mark Stocker           Curator, Historical International Art              January 2017