Prints and the Pursuit of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe (Harvard Art Museum) [Paperback]

I visited the exhibit in person and also bought the catalogue because the prints on display were of wonderful quality and I had not ever before seen some of them. The book is superficially attractive but after looking at most of the images carefully and reading the text carefully I am profoundly disappointed. I had the same feeling when I read the text that was part of the exhibit, but the problems are much more flagrant in the book. Susan Dackerman does not understand the difference between practical mathematics, natural philosophy, natural history and science and continually conflates them. Seemingly, she thinks that everything that is "technical" is "scientific" and because these prints reflect instruments, astronomy and other practical pursuits they represent "science" In point of fact there is not one single print relating to "science" in the entire work (one can possibly except the Galileo moon illustrations, but these were misdescribed). It isn't until the final essay on Allegory by Katherine Park that some clarity enters the text and "practical mathematics" is used correctly and not confused with natural philosophy and intellectual order is produced.

The text abounds with error; far too many to list here but some of the more egregious ones relate to Hendrik Goltzius' 1598 portrait of Nicolaus Petri van Deventer (image 5). The text misidentifies a quadrant on the table in front of the subject, calling it a "sextant" and claims a figure in the background is using a "forerunner" of the sextant but yet this is called a sextant in Dackerman's text (it is neither). Jan Saenredam's map (image 89) is suggested to be useful for practical navigation because it has a compass rose, dividers and a scale. This most certainly is not a sea chart and would be useless for navigational purposes. The ship firing a cannon is a common device and the map is certainly not "artistically virtuosic" - apparently the writer is unfamiliar with truly "virtuosic" maps of this period, is unaware of the decorations used conventionally and has never seen a sea chart. In addition, Saenredam is but a footnote to 16th century cartography. Tooley merely lists him as "an engraver" and Karrow, in his exhaustive work on 16th-century cartographers doesn't even include him in his index! With all of the superb examples of 16th c cartography available it is difficult to understand why such a mediocre specimen of dead-end mapmaking should be extolled with such naive enthusiasm.

Not every cut surface is a "cross-section" and the term is used incorrectly with reference to Baldung's dissection of the head (images 10). Indeed, the ventral view of the intact skull in the last view of this series is not even a section!

Hartmann Schedel's book, known in English as the Nuremberg Chronicle is referred to as his "Weltchronik". Indeed it is a Weltchronik but that is not its title as implied in the text. It's only fairly recent that the work in German is referred to colloquially as Die Schedlesche Weltchronik. The book's first appearance in 1493 in Latin is generally called the Liber Chronicarum and the German one is generally referred to as Das Buch der Chronik.

Throughout this work, one gets the impression that many of the contributors are unfamiliar with the contextual material and the very reasons why the contemporary workers persevered with their efforts. For Lorraine Daston to project her opinions regarding observational studies as "boring" (page 128) is gratuitously insulting to subject matter and those who studied it. "Sheer boredom" is not an acceptable descriptor of the study of insect "entrails". Following such deprecatory rhetoric, one might conclude that Titian had to be bored beyond all reason since he was compelled to transfer so many brushloads of paint to canvas. I would also like to have a reference to her claim that "early modern scientific observers went blind from squinting at the viscera of insects under powerful lenses in the noonday sun..."

The reproduction of images in the book is profoundly disturbing. Most of the prints on exhibit are high-quality impressions, black-on-white and this is reasonably well reproduced in the eleven images, for example, by Stradanus. However, many, if not most, of the book's reproductions are for some strange reason printed in sepia with the paper shown as a lighter sepia. The reproductions of images by Cornelis Drebbel (98) are ridiculous to the extreme. These are, in reality, brilliant black/white prints but for some reason have been printed as sepia/sepia and look as though they were printed on paper grocery bags, not fine white paper. Philip Galle's Alchemist (96) is reproduced as a disgusting brown image completely unlike the original. Someone unfamiliar with prints from this period might conclude that they were all brownish - perhaps whoever designed the book thought that old paper needed to be browned or yellowed.

From the standpoint of a scholarly record of the images (which is why I bought the book) the catalogue is nearly worthless. They might just as well have printed the plates purple and magenta.

So, as a visual record the book fails miserably and as a scholarly interpretation it is sufficiently wrong to be useless.

Clearly a lot of work and expense went into this work but unfortunately Susan Dackerman was not up to the job. It is an expensive disaster and in earlier times Harvard would have been ashamed to put something like this forward and probably would have not have done so.

This is a fabulous book especially for those interested in early Renaissance printmaking, history and science. Clearly time, expense and effort were not issues when publishing this tome. Many leading Renaissance artist's etchings and block prints are included-Durer & Goltzius among them. A wealth of obscure and marvelous images of scientific themes are included and range from Astrology, Cartography, Natural History, Anthropology, Anatomy to Measurement, Biology, Zoology, Geometry, Botany etc. Many reproductions are enlarged. Therefore detailed line "hatching" and "stippling" can clearly be seen. The scholarly text is exhaustive and academic. My only gripe- it's a weighty paperback, having been printed on heavy glossy & matt stock. Because of this, I foresee future problems with the spine & binding falling apart with use. We shall see! Otherwise- superior buy.

Not always being able to attend all the shows & exhibits that I would like; it is really terrific to be able to get a high quality catalogue of an exhibition. One that gives you the feel and scope of the exhibition.