Three men sacrificing a pig

Engravers in the region of Mantua, such as Adamo Scultori (a.ka. Adamo Ghisi) and his sister, Diana Mantuana, learned much from the prints of Marcantonio Raimondi and his followers. Given the strong tradition of engraving and fine metalworking in their home city, however, their prints look quite different from those made in Rome. Here, Scultori worked from a dark background achieved with parallel lines and notched dots, and then used profuse dotting to punctuate an otherwise well-known system of crossed lines at the edges of his forms. The flattened surface imitates relief sculpture.

This engraving is probably made after a drawing by Giulio Romano, now lost, and is related to an ancient sculpture in the National Archaeological Museum, Naples, although most probably derived from a gem of the same subject.

The subject of a sacrifice appealed to the taste for the antique in Mantua, originating in part with Mantegna two generations earlier. The print’s designer, Giulio Romano, was the apprentice and then chief assistant to Raphael in Rome, but spent his mature years in Mantua, where he executed many frescoes and panel paintings to decorate the court of Federico II Gonzaga (1500–1540).

This engraving is in the so-called King George IV album of Old Master prints, acquired by the Dominion Museum, forerunner of Te Papa, in 1910.

Sources:

British Museum Collection online, http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objec tId=1493957&partId=1&searchText=scultori+pig&page=1

Rhode Island School of Design catalogue, http://risdmuseum.org/art_design/objects/373_sacrifice_of_a_pig

Dr Mark Stocker   Curator, Historical International Art    March 2017