The Master FVB (active circa 1480-1500)

Saint Paul (B. 13; Lehrs 27)

Details

The Master FVB (active circa 1480-1500)
Saint Paul (B. 13; Lehrs 27)
engraving, circa 1490-1500, a superb impression of this very rare engraving, printing with exceptional contrasts and subtlety, with even the finest lines printing clearly, trimmed inside the platemark but retaining a fillet of blank paper outside the borderline on three sides, a skilfully made-up blank strip along the left sheet edge, just touching the hand and the guard and pommel of the sword, a repair at upper left, the subject otherwise in very good condition
S. 185 x 103 mm.

Provenance

Albert van Loock (b. 1917), Brussels (L. 3751).

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Charlie Scott

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Lot Essay

Given the stylistic similarities to the Flemish masters, in particular Dirk Bouts and Hans Memling, it is today generally agreed that the Master FVB was also a Fleming and that his monogram might stand for ‘F… van Bruges’. Technically certainly influenced by Schongauer, some of whose plates he copied, the Master FVB however developed a style of his own, characterized by a subtlety of shading and a statuesque quality in his figures unsurpassed until Leyden and Dürer. Max Lehrs considered him the finest of all Netherlandish engravers of the 15th century.

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