Title page (III. Terra. Hexaedron)

Jost Amman, artist

1539–1591

Wenzel Jamnitzer, artist

1507 or 1508–1585

Title page (III. Terra. Hexaedron), 1568

Portfolio/Series title: Perspectiva corporum regularium (Perspective of Ruled Shapes)

Where object was made: Nuremberg, Holy Roman Empire (present-day Germany)

Material/technique: engraving

Dimensions:
Plate Mark/Block Dimensions (Height x Width): 260 x 180 mm
Plate Mark/Block Dimensions (Height x Width): 10 1/4 x 7 1/16 in
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 274 x 191 mm
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 10 13/16 x 7 1/2 in
Mat Dimensions (Height x Width): 19 x 14 in

Credit line: Museum purchase: Letha Churchill Walker Memorial Art Fund

Accession number: 2014.0313.12

Not on display

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Amman was a 16th-century painter and printmaker who executed W. Jamnitzer’s famous book Perspectiva corporum regularium (Perspective of Ruled Shapes), which depicts five geometrical bodies known as Platonic solids, considered to be the building blocks of the material world. The first four are associated with the elements (fire, air, earth, and water)—pictured here in alignment with the exhibition’s theme, earth, associated with the hexahedron.
In this work, Jamnitzer exhibits knowledge of both Platonic form and Euclidean geometry, illustrating the Renaissance obsession with geometric and perspectival rendering.