4. Hans Sebald Beham
(1500-1550)

Christ Bearing the Cross

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Beham, Christ Bearing the Cross

Christ Bearing the Cross

Woodcut, 1521, 124 x 85 mm., Bartsch 89, Pauli 823 ii/ii, from The Passion. Strong and clear impression and, even though of the second state, showing virtually no wear or clotting, on laid paper with narrow margins outside the borderline. Better than the B.M. example reproduced in The Illustrated Bartsch. Beham, though he did no engravings of the subject, did produce a set of eight woodcuts of the Passion, early works, but striking both in their originality of conception (arches are used as compositional elements in six of the eight) and in their expert use of the medium. Certainly, he must have cut the blocks himself. The second states are after the removal of the date 1521 from the monogram area.