Johann Rottenhammer
Minerva as Patroness of Music
1600
Scroll
Johann Rottenhammer
Minerva as Patroness of Music
1600
Physical Qualities
Oil on copper, 10 3/4 x 13 1/8 in. (27.3 x 33.3 cm.)
Credit Line
W. Clagett Emory Bequest Fund, in Memory of his Parents, William H. Emory of A and Martha B. Emory; William A. Dickey, Jr. Fund; and Saidie A. May Bequest Fund
Object Number
1967.47
In this abundant landscape, the Muses of Greece’s Mount Helicon recline and play music surrounded by tender putti (cherubs). Minerva, goddess of art, music, and war, stands among them to listen to them play. The German artist Johann Rottenhammer, who spent most of his career in Italy, depicted this story from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. The painter used rich colors and delicate brushstrokes on a copper panel, a rare, smooth support that enhanced the jewel-like quality of the painting.
Publication References
BMA News (1968), pp. 18-19.
Heiner Borggrefe et al., Hans Rottenhammer: begehrt–vergessen–neu entdeckt (München: Hirmer Verlag GmbH, 2008), pp. 38–39, fig. 57.
The Baltimore Museum of Art by purchase, August 1, 1968; F. Kleinberger and Co., New York, by purchase, March 1965; Kunsthandlung Julius Böhler, Munich; Formerly collection of S.J. de Vries, Amsterdam.
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Hochmann, Michel. “Hans Rottenhammer and Pietro Mera: Two Northern Artists in Rome and Venice.” The Burlington Magazine 145, no. 1206 (Sep. 2003): pp. 641-645.
Woollett, Anne T. and Ariane van Suchtelen. Rubens and Brueghel: A Working Friendship (Zwolle: Waanders Publishers, 2006).
Heiner Borggrefe et al. Hans Rottenhammer: begehrt–vergessen–neu entdeckt (München: Hirmer Verlag GmbH, 2008).
De Vries, Lyckle. Stories in Gilded Frames: Dutch-Seventeenth-Century Paintings with Biblical and Mythological Subjects (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2016).
Quach McCabe, Sophia. “Intermediaries and the Market: Hans Rottenhammer’s Use of Networks in the Copper Painting Market.” Arts (Basel) 8, no. 2 (June 2019): pp. 1-23.
Phoenix Art Museum. Copper as Canvas: Two Centuries of Masterpiece Paintings on Copper, 1575-1775 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999).
Woollett, Anne T. and Ariane van Suchtelen. Rubens and Brueghel: A Working Friendship (Zwolle: Waanders Publishers, 2006).
Heiner Borggrefe et al. Hans Rottenhammer: begehrt–vergessen–neu entdeckt (München: Hirmer Verlag GmbH, 2008).
De Vries, Lyckle. Stories in Gilded Frames: Dutch-Seventeenth-Century Paintings with Biblical and Mythological Subjects (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2016).
Quach McCabe, Sophia. “Intermediaries and the Market: Hans Rottenhammer’s Use of Networks in the Copper Painting Market.” Arts (Basel) 8, no. 2 (June 2019): pp. 1-23.
Phoenix Art Museum. Copper as Canvas: Two Centuries of Masterpiece Paintings on Copper, 1575-1775 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999).