 |
| Emperor Maximilian's Triumphal Arch |
This is an image of a 10 square meter composite woodcut print created in 1515 (in an edition of 700!) for the then emperor of the Holy Roman Empire; a man whose ideas, like Leonardo's, were ahead of materials and technology.
In order to help establish and secure his reputation throughout his kingdom and posterity he conceived the idea of a Triumphal Arch on paper to be posted in villages and cities in his domain. Created from 195 block prints on 36 large sheets of paper, the resulting monster print became a testament to him that was over 3 meters tall. Incredible. It was accompanied by a Processional "print" that was 50 yards long!
This amazing undertaking appeared as a paragraph in the same Albrecht Durer biography from my previous post.
The effort strikes me as an early effort in social media; using wood blocks and paper instead of Twitter and Facebook to get one's narrative told the way one wanted...but what a Herculean effort to pull it off! Of course Old Albrecht had a big part in making it but I learned that the actual "carving of the blocks", his and everybody's back then, was done by formschneiders, woodblock cutters. Who knew?
So once again I am humbled and amazed by the ambition, resolve, and limitless appetite of royalty through the ages.