?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 5,000
LUCAS VAN LEYDEN Young Man with a Skull.
Engraving, circa 1519. 180x140 mm; 7 1/8x5 1/2 inches. First state (of 2). Trimmed on or just inside the plate mark. A good impression of this scarce engraving.
According to the Art Institute of Chicago, where there is another first state impression of this engraving, "Once interpreted as Lucas van Leyden's [circa 1494-1533] self-portrait, this print is sometimes entitled Memento Mori (or, Remember you must die). The well-dressed, anonymous figure considers his mortality while pointing at the human skull (which may or may not be real) tucked under his cloak. This image predates by eighty years Shakespeare's Hamlet, with his famous speech on poor Yorick's fate, traditionally delivered with the jester's actual skull in hand. Bartsch 174; Volbehr 158; New Hollstein 174.
