Putti als wagenmenners 1580

Curator: Here we have "Putti als wagenmenners," or "Putti as Chariot Drivers," a 1580 print, engraving on paper and ink by Onofrio Panvinio. Editor: Gosh, what a riot! A joyful mess of cherubic chaos, like a Renaissance rave happening inside a very formal frieze. So much dynamic energy contained in such delicate lines. Curator: Exactly. Think about the process; engraving involves a highly skilled craft of inscribing these lines into a metal plate, usually copper. Ink is then pressed into these lines, and the image is transferred to paper. It's a laborious process demanding immense precision. And this image isn't meant to depict actual history, but instead showcase an ideal form based on Classical models. Editor: The materials and labor contrast strangely with the subject. A rigid, painstaking method employed to depict total, uninhibited play. These little angels don't seem worried at all about their roles or functions. Curator: The very consumption of art during the late Renaissance shifted towards private collections, driving printmaking. More homes and aristocratic libraries could consume art at much cheaper than a painting, widening the accessibility of historical allegories. Editor: Yes! A dissemination of this image from singular possession toward, well, the hands of whoever could afford a copy. I imagine the paper feels smooth but delicate, so each viewer might take the art's safekeeping on themselves. The preciousness of paper! Almost as if the owners became personal curators. Curator: And the ink creates a sharp contrast against the starkness of the paper, enabling an accessibility in the shadows of the drawing, not simply the distribution. It gives the art a certain…legibility across social classes, who each engage in their own methods. Editor: Makes you wonder how something made so carefully can exude such carefree abandon. Look at those plump little cherubs whipping their lion-pulled chariots! And somehow that care carries throughout this engraving in small form; there is freedom in detail. Curator: Ultimately, the enduring fascination is with this relationship between medium and message. From the tangible processes involved in the image’s making to our act of encountering it. Editor: From my perspective, as an Artist, viewing this art instills in me the joy that history, like creation, has always existed with the unruliness and innocence of children in mind.