Plate C2, Jost Amman; Wenzel Jamnitzer

Artwork Overview

Jost Amman; Wenzel Jamnitzer, Plate C2
Jost Amman; Wenzel Jamnitzer, Plate C2
Jost Amman , Wenzel Jamnitzer
Plate C2
1568
Jost Amman, artist
1539–1591
Wenzel Jamnitzer, artist
1507 or 1508–1585
Plate C2, 1568
Where object was made: Nuremberg, Holy Roman Empire (present-day Germany)
Material/technique: engraving
Dimensions:
Plate Mark/Block Dimensions (Height x Width): 154 x 174 mm
Plate Mark/Block Dimensions (Height x Width): 6 1/16 x 6 7/8 in
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 269 x 186 mm
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 10 9/16 x 7 5/16 in
Mat Dimensions (Height x Width): 19 x 14 in
Credit line: Museum purchase: Letha Churchill Walker Memorial Art Fund
Accession number: 2014.0313.15
Not on display
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Images

Label texts

Big Botany: Conversations with the Plant World
These etchings by Jost Amman render the five Platonic solids and the elements that were associated with them from antiquity through the Renaissance. There are exactly five Platonic solids, defined as polyhedra with equivalent faces composed of congruent convex regular polygons. Remarkably, knowledge of this special group of solids was known 1,000 years before Plato in Neolithic Scotland. Amman’s etchings are renderings of designs by goldsmith and printmaker Wenzel Jamnitzer, and they are an eloquent expression of the idea that all existence derives from fundamental mathematical principles. In addition to the creation of unique, inventive metalworks and designs, Jamnitzer also created mounts for naturalia to be included in curiosity cabinets. Metallurgical and astronomical equipment and life-casts of reptiles, insects, and other small animals produced by his workshop testify to Jamnitzer’s diverse scientific and artistic interests. In 1568, Jamnitzer published his Perspectiva Corporum Regularium (Perspective of Ruled Shapes), the celebrated collection of studies of various polyhedra, which includes these etchings, among others. For the title page for Earth, Jamnitzer turned to botanical imagery, implying the mathematical underpinnings of botanical form.
Big Botany: Conversations with the Plant World
These etchings by Jost Amman render the five Platonic solids and the elements that were associated with them from antiquity through the Renaissance. There are exactly five Platonic solids, defined as polyhedra with equivalent faces composed of congruent convex regular polygons. Remarkably, knowledge of this special group of solids was known 1,000 years before Plato in Neolithic Scotland. Amman’s etchings are renderings of designs by goldsmith and printmaker Wenzel Jamnitzer, and they are an eloquent expression of the idea that all existence derives from fundamental mathematical principles. In addition to the creation of unique, inventive metalworks and designs, Jamnitzer also created mounts for naturalia to be included in curiosity cabinets. Metallurgical and astronomical equipment and life-casts of reptiles, insects, and other small animals produced by his workshop testify to Jamnitzer’s diverse scientific and artistic interests. In 1568, Jamnitzer published his Perspectiva Corporum Regularium (Perspective of Ruled Shapes), the celebrated collection of studies of various polyhedra, which includes these etchings, among others. For the title page for Earth, Jamnitzer turned to botanical imagery, implying the mathematical underpinnings of botanical form.
Terra Anima
Amman was a 16th-century painter and printmaker who executed W. Jamnitzer’s famous book Perspectiva corporum regularium (Perspective of Ruled Shapes), which depicts five geometrical bodies known as Platonic solids, considered to be the building blocks of the material world. The first four are associated with the elements (fire, air, earth, and water)—pictured here in alignment with the exhibition’s theme, earth, associated with the hexahedron.
Terra Anima
Amman was a 16th-century painter and printmaker who executed W. Jamnitzer’s famous book Perspectiva corporum regularium (Perspective of Ruled Shapes), which depicts five geometrical bodies known as Platonic solids, considered to be the building blocks of the material world. The first four are associated with the elements (fire, air, earth, and water)—pictured here in alignment with the exhibition’s theme, earth, associated with the hexahedron.

Exhibitions

Big Botany: Conversations with the Plant World
Stephen Goddard, curator
2018
Terra Anima
Joey Orr, curator
2017

Citations

Goddard, Stephen H, ed. Big Botany Conversations with the Plant World. Lawrence, Kansas: Spencer Museum of Art, The University of Kansas, 2018.