Virgin and Child in the Grotto (Adoration of the Magi) (c. 1500): Art, History and Details

Virgin and Child in the Grotto (Adoration of the Magi) (c. 1500) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Premier Engraver (Italian, active about 1500); Andrea Mantegna (Italian, about 1431–1506).

The work and its context

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

This is one of the earliest surviving in-progress engravings. An unknown engraver collaborating with Andrea Mantegna made the large print based on a group of figures in Mantegna’s altarpiece Adoration of the Magi. An excerpt from a larger composition, it shows the Virgin Mary and Christ child, Joseph, and a wise man in an elaborate cave. The engraver first outlined the main features of the composition and then systematically filled them in with hatching. The outlines appear intuitive, even sketchy, suggesting that the engraver used a pen-and-ink drawing by Mantegna as a model rather than the painting itself.

Object facts

• Title: Virgin and Child in the Grotto (Adoration of the Magi)
• Date: c. 1500
• Creator attribution: Premier Engraver (Italian, active about 1500); Andrea Mantegna (Italian, about 1431–1506)
• Culture: Italy
• Type: Print
• Technique: engraving
• Dimensions: Sheet: 39 x 28.5 cm (15 3/8 x 11 1/4 in.)
• Collection: PR - Engraving
• Department: Prints
• Accession number: 1954.66

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Prasse, Leona. "The Engraving of Andrea Mantegna." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 43, no. 4 (April 1956): 59-62.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.

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.