Item #11332 Dance of Death [Danse des Morts du Bâle] collected plates
Dance of Death [Danse des Morts du Bâle] collected plates
Dance of Death [Danse des Morts du Bâle] collected plates
Dance of Death [Danse des Morts du Bâle] collected plates
Dance of Death [Danse des Morts du Bâle] collected plates
Dance of Death [Danse des Morts du Bâle] collected plates

Item Details

Dance of Death [Danse des Morts du Bâle] collected plates.

Basel, Switzerland: Unknown, [late 19th century/early 20th century]. Unknown edition. Quarter calf. “Dance of Death”: late-medieval allegory on the universality of death. With Hans Holbein the Younger, the Danse macabre takes on a completely new artistic form. This depicts the brutal irruption of Death in work and the joy of living. This representation takes precedence over the idea that death spares no social class. In 1538, with the publication of Les simulacres de la Mort, Hans Holbein the Younger redefines the theme of the danse macabre. Death, always aggressive and jubilant, no longer dances in a long farandole, but intervenes directly in scenes of daily life. From then on, Holbein's work became the reference. This is a series of 41 woodcuts, which were originally executed around 1526 and published 12 years later in Basel, in a collection entitled: Les simulacres et historiées faces de la mort. It was Holbein who really brought the Danse Macabre into bibliophilia, and it was also he who fundamentally changed its didactic purpose....The woodcuts bear the monogram "GS" by Georg Scharffenberg, woodcut engraver. This copy appears prints are clipped and repasted into a collection. No text present. Very Good+. Completely detached front board, evidence of red rot, rubbing to extremities, otherwise a good copy. Quarter calf over marbled boards. 41 unnumbered leaves of woodcuts. Lacking frontispiece and tp. Item #11332

Price: $500.00

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