May Day Celebrations at Xeuilley

Jacques Callot

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Born in the Duchy of Lorraine, Callot spent his formative years at the Medici court in Florence where he recorded elaborate court pageants and festivals in an elegant Mannerist style. Following the death of Cosimo de’Medici in 1621, he returned to Nancy where he embarked upon a successful career as a printmaker, treating a wide range of subjects from the court to the countryside, from military battles to biblical scenes. This boldly-worked sheet is a study for an etching depicting a May Day celebration in a village recently identified as Xeuilley, a small town in Lorraine where Callot’s family owned property. A massive oak tree dominates the village green, providing shade for the dancing villagers and seating for the musicians. The subject gave Callot the opportunity to mix country folk with more elegantly dressed observers in an expansive sun-washed space, reminiscent of a theatrical set. The scene echoes, albeit on a smaller scale, the panoramic ambitions of The Fair at Impruneta, the recently completed masterpiece of his Florentine period. Perrin Stein, May 2014

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art