The Fall of Adam and Eve (1525, printed later): Art, History and Details

The Fall of Adam and Eve (1525, printed later) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Hans Burgkmair (German, 1473–1531).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This story of Adam and Eve occurs in a tropical location, placing the Garden of Eden closer to what viewers may have believed to be its true location. Palm trees were also associated with human virtues in devotional literature of the time. The artist’s version of the Genesis story places the blame for human transgression squarely on Eve, who appears to persuade Adam to partake of the fruit, while a monkey, a symbol of bodily pleasure, mimics the humans by bringing fruit to its mouth. Since they were often hung on walls, like paintings, prints of this size rarely survive.

Object facts

• Title: The Fall of Adam and Eve
• Date: 1525, printed later
• Creator attribution: Hans Burgkmair (German, 1473–1531)
• Culture: Germany
• Type: Print
• Technique: woodcut on eight sheets of paper
• Dimensions: Platemark: 95 x 65.4 cm (37 3/8 x 25 3/4 in.); Sheet: 95.7 x 66.2 cm (37 11/16 x 26 1/16 in.)
• Collection: PR - Woodcut
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 1951.278

A detail from the museum

In this second state of the print, Eve's nudity was covered with an olive leaf.

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Prasse, Leona. "'The Fall of Adam and Eve' by Burgkmair." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 40, no. 6 (June 1953): 112-113.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.