Stefano Della Bella, 2 Baroque Etchings 17th Century, 1646, Raccolta..cartele Et Ornamenti, N°12+8

Stefano DELLA BELLA (1610 - 1664)
Two 17th century etchings in the same frame, baroque cartouches for coats of arms, belonging to the series of 18 etchings engraved by Stefano Della Bella and published by François Langlois entitled “Raccolta Di Varii Cappriccii Et Nove Inventtioni Di Cartele Et Ornamenti”, here plates N° 12 + n°8
Mentions: Stef Della Bella fecit / F. L. D. A Ciartres excud. Cum Privil. RegisChris. / engraved by Della Bella and published in 1646 by François Langlois featuring the best museum collections.

Condition report: Good condition, some foxing and oxidation, beautiful frame (gilt frame with marie-louise).

Dimensions: 25 x 19 cm / Framed: 52 x 37 cm

An elegant set of two 17th-century etchings, presented in a single, high-quality frame.
These etchings were created by the Florentine designer, engraver, and etcher Stefano Della Bella.

The inventiveness of these ornamental caprices, intended to adorn coats of arms, is striking for their Baroque quality and integrity.
A variation of exuberant rocaille motifs interspersed with helmets, figures, and animals, surrounds a blank coat of arms cartouche, customizable according to the final commissioner.

These etchings belong to a series comprising a total of 18 etchings created in 1646 during Stefano Della Bella's stay in France between 1639 and 1649, during the reign of Louis XIV.

Our gallery has six of the eighteen etchings that make up this virtuoso series.

Six etchings grouped together in pairs in three frames.

The price shown is per framed set (each frame containing two etchings, the numbers of which within the series are indicated in each of the notices).
Contact us if you would like to purchase all six etchings, divided into three different frames.

The Louvre's Department of Graphic Arts has an album of original drawings made in pen, brown ink, and black chalk, likely related to our series of prints.

This album was seized during the Revolution and entered the museum's collections in 1796.
Seized during the Revolution in Modena from the Collections of Ercole III d'Este from October 25 to 27, 1796 (Brumaire, Year V) at the suggestion of the commissioners of the Government of the Republic, J. P. Tiner, J. S. Berthélémy, and C. Berthollet; returned to the Museum in July 1797 (Thermidor, Year V).

Our series of prints was published in 1646, one year before his death in 1647, by François Langlois (baptized in Chartres in 1588 and died in Paris in 1647), a painter, but above all a publisher and print dealer in Chartres who collaborated with Stefano Della Bella and also with Van Dyck. He was a print collector for the Earl of Arundel.

Each rocaille motif is enriched with highly ornamental, heraldic, and martial Baroque fantasies, connoting power (royal, imperial, and Christian), with a hermeneutic that is always intriguing and abundant.
Rich bestiaries (bull, lion, hunting trophy), angels, and scrolling mascarons intertwine in turn; archangels swirl with the welcoming and humble Christian symbolism of the scallop shell amidst griffins, laurel wreaths, and oriental turbans; or else fascinating eagles, helmets topped with feathers, cherubs armed with trumpets supporting a crown, and shields flanked by jellyfish, rub shoulders.

It should be noted that the cartouches, remarkably ornamented with foliage, angels, and bestiaries, are left blank with the coats of arms of their recipients.

We know that Stefano Della Bella created an etching of the Medici coat of arms, which paid him a pension as drawing master to the Prince, a position he accepted after having executed commissions from Richelieu and then Mazarin.
And that etching No. 6 of this same series, although published with the privilege of King Louis XIV, depicts the Medici coat of arms.
A fertile imaginative work under the guidance of Stefano della Bella, an important Baroque and Mannerist engraver featured in the collections of the Louvre, the Uffizi, and Windsor Castle.

This series of etchings, dating from 1646, is entitled "Collection of Various Caprices and New Designs of Cartouches and Ornaments" and is in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art, which owns all eighteen of these etchings. It also features in the prestigious The MET collection and, finally, in the collections of the Petit Palais in Paris under the original title: "Raccolta Di Varii Cappriccii Et Nove Inventioni Di Cartele Et Ornamenti."

This series of etchings in the form of caprices, inventions of cartouches and ornaments, perfectly embodies the spirit of an era both majestic and capable of exuberance, imagination, and exoticism, even in its dream of coats of arms.