COPPERPLATE ENGRAVING – “THE PENITENT MAGDALEN ” from the original painting by Pompeo Battoni, and engraved by W. L. Overbeck, and published in the mid 1800’s.  The means by which a copperplate is engraved gives it more detail and depth to the picture.  Copperplate engravings are seen as the most perfect means of reproducing a painting or other forms of visual art, thus giving it the most artistic value of any form of engraving.  This engraving is in very good condition.  The actual engraving measures 4 1/2” x 7 3/8”, and is matted to 16” x 20” for easy framing. 

     The rule of the Italians in the kingdom of art ended with the seventeenth century.  The following century saw Italian art as a faded flower, without colour or fragrance cast on the ground.  It was only in the work of former centuries that art was still living; only the works of old masters, only the country continued to be a school of art, but no more the works of the living artists, among whom genius was extinct; nothing but the barren, insipid imagination of imitations, nothing but the bare mechanical handicraft being left.  There were only a few artists scattered here and there, with Battoni among the first of them, who, rising from the general lethargy and impotence, tried to infuse a new life into the old traditions; but even their exertions never succeeded in producing any thing better, than what may by accomplished be mere industry, and taught and practiced in academies of art.  Pompeo Girolamo Battoni was a native of Lucca, where he was born in 1708.  He was employed and distinguished by the three popes under whom he lived, by the  Emperor Joseph II, Maria Theresia and other contemporaries.  He was a friend of Raphael Mengs’, who, like him, was among the few, that rose above the level of the artists of those time. One of the best and most popular of his pictures is the one which represents the repentant Magdalen.  The original is distinguished by a warm and delicate colour, and correct drawing.  It is much admired on account of its graceful forms, and its excellent composition.  Some of the admirers, more enthusiastic than intelligent and discerning, have declared it to be equal to the Magdalen by Correggio which seems to have suggested to Battoni the idea of painting this picture, some of the details of which remind us of that great masterpiece of Correggio’s; but Battoni’s work is deficient of that wonderful touch of life pervading it and in the charm of colour by which Correggio’s work is distinguished.  Battoni, in painting his Magdalen, is more anxious, it is true, to represent her in her strictly historical and biblical character, struggling as a repentant sinner, but he has done so too superficially.  We see the external attitude of pious contrition rather than the feeling of it expressed in the picture.  It may be of some interest to know, that Frederic II, of Prussia, when he happened to be in Dresden, in the seven years’ war, after having visited the Dresden Picture-Gallery several times, is said to have ordered the court painter Dietrich to copy for him the Magdalen by Battoni, but in doing so, to leave out the skull, belonging to the original.

                                                                                    By Carl Clauss

IMPORTANT TO NOTE

Antique prints, engravings, and lithographs are printing processes, which use steel, copper, stone or wood blocks or plates to produce a picture on paper.

Most antique prints and engravings, which are seen on the internet today, are bookplates.  Because they are pages from a book, there are multiple copies in existence.  This does not, however, mean that they are "reproductions" that have been printed recently.  Because they were, at some point, part of books, some have been preserved in excellent condition, while others show signs of age, as yellow spots or darkness on the edge of the page from being handled.

Engravings, and lithographs are high quality pieces of art, as it took a highly trained artist many hours of work to produce one.  Although there may be multiple copies still in existence, the date of the item should be stated in the auction, thus giving the buyer an idea of its age.

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