PRINTED IN BRIGHT SANGUINE, BY A FLEMISH ENGRAVER IN VENICE. 26.9 x 19.2 cm to platemarks. Printed in bright sanguine ink on perfectly contemporary, rather thin watermarked paper with broad margins, 27.9 x 20.2 cm overall. Two nearly invisible repairs to verso; paper structurally a little weak, but still a very fine impression. Unrecorded state, printed in strikingly rich sanguine, of this separately-issued depiction of St. Anthony of Egypt not beset by demons, as in the typical Temptation of St. Anthony but rather surrounded by his traditional iconography including a pig and a fire (a reference to ergotism). The Golden Age of printing in sanguine was the 18th century; it is extremely rare to find any example of sanguine printing before 1700 (we count fewer than half-a-dozen examples in auction records, according to Rare Book Hub). Sometimes considered the first Christian monk, Anthony (ca. 251-356) was born in Lower Egypt to a wealthy family, but chose a life of wandering asceticism beginning around 270. Various legends explain his association with pigs, fire, and bells all depicted here, alongside a book on a rustically-fashioned table. According to one version of events, for example, Anthony embarked on a Promethean journey to Hell into order to steal fire for the benefit of mankind; to aid in his theft, he sent a piglet with a bell tied around its neck to wreak havoc in the underworld and distract its demon guardians. Medieval monks of the Order of St. Anthony were apparently known for their skill in treating ergotism (caused by a fungus infecting rye, which produces LSD-like alkaloids); hence, Anthony was traditionally invoked by those suffering from this disease, and the moniker St. Anthonys Fire was born. Although it had long been used as red chalk for preparatory drawings, sanguine printing during the 16th and 17th centuries is extremely uncommon. The present example was executed in a particularly rich tone, and we wonder whether the strike may have been a printer-publishers experiment with the ubiquitous artists pigment. Justus Sadeler (ca. 1572-1620) was an Antwerp engraver who arrived in Venice in 1596, operating a print-shop there with his father Jan and his uncle Raphael. Odoardo Fialleti (1573-1637) had studied in Bologna at the same time as the Carraccis before joining the Tintoretto workshop in Venice circa 1590; his style is said to reflect the influence of both those masters. Laura Walters (2009) discusses in some detail the influence on English tastes and artists of this "under-studied pupil of Tintoretto". "The status of his English contacts combined with the knowledge concerning the later copies of his drawing book by English artists attests to his impact on the formation of an Italianate sensibility in the appreciation and connoisseurship of the visual arts in England.While Odoardo Fialetti probably never left Italy, his ideas concerning good disegno were appreciated by English diplomats, collectors, connoisseurs, and artists passing through Venice, and brought back from the continent via paintings and printed works by the artist. These ideas, which were copied by later English artists and resonated with the burgeoning collective seventeenth century English tastes in Italian art." (p. 200). The print itself, even in its regular state, is rare. The British Museum copy (U,5.41), bequeathed by Sir Hans Sloane in 1753, is in dreadful condition. Hollstein notes only the Rijksmuseum and Brussels examples. A copy in the Metropolitan Museum in New York has been misidentified as St Anthony of Padua, and has been trimmed a full 2 cm within the platemark probably excising the captions. * Hollstein, Dutch and Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts c.1450-1700 Vol 21, #48 (this state unrecorded); and cf Walters, Odoardo Fialetti (1573-c. 1638): The Interrelation of Venetian Art and Anatomy, and his Importance in England (PhD thesis, 2009).
