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Etching and engraving after Hans Vredeman de Vries, 210 x 257 mm. New Hollstein (Van Doetecum) 163, 2nd state (of 2).
Impression of the 2nd state (of 2), with the excudit of Theodoor Galle replacing Hieronymus Cock’s motto bottom right.
Fine impression printed on watermarked laid paper (watermark: cross of Lorraine). A small fold in the bottom right corner, two tiny stains in the upper part and an area of paper thinning in the bottom margin, otherwise in very good condition. Margins around the platemark (sheet: 259 x 278 mm).
The Imaginary view of a street with the house Aux Quatre Vents is the first plate of a series of twenty perspective views designed by Hans Vredeman de Vries and etched by the brothers Joannes et Lucas van Doetecum: Scenographiae sive perspectivae ut Aedificia, hoc modo ad opticam excitata. Pictorum vulgus vocat pulcherrimae viginti selectissimarum fabricarum. This series, also known as “The Large Perspective Book” was first published by Hieronymus Cock. It “evoke[s] a new world of modern interiors and buildings presented ina wide variety of settings and spaces.” (Peter Fuhring, Hieronymus Cock, p. 196)
The first plate in the series depicts an imaginary view of Hieronymus Cock’s well-known print publishing house. Jan van der Stock describes it as follows: “This plate […] has Cock posing in the doorway of the house Aux Quatre Vents, identified by a sign with the heads of four putti blowing in the four cardinal directions, with, below them, the French inscription IIII vens. Cock’s wife, Volcxken Diericx, stands behind the counter inside the shop in front of shelves on which packs of prints are stacked. A monumental representation of the Raising of the Brazen Serpent can be made out through the doorway on the right […] The richly ornamented architecture is the product of Vredeman de Vries’s imagination, but is based at least partially on reality.” (Hieronymus Cock, p. 76)
The couple of publishers had in fact initially chosen the Nieuwe Beurs district, the new commercial heart of the city [of Antwerp]. It was here, on the northern corner of the Sint-Kathelijnevest – then still called Cattestraat – and the Lange Nieuwstraat, that the publishing house Aux Quatre Vents was established. Engravings were printed there from 20 November 1556 until 24 October 1565. (Hieronymus Cock, p. 17).
On our impression, the inscription IIII vents has been erased by the new publisher of the series, Theodoor Galle (1571-1633), who was the godson of Volcxken Diericx and the eldest son of Philippe Galle. The latter was one of the executors of Hieronymus Cock’s widow’s wishes when she died in 1600. Theodoor Galle then acquired more than 300 plates from Hieronymus Cock’s stock, which he reissued by replacing the name of the former publisher with his own. Theodoor Galle’s stock passed in 1636 to his eldest son, Joannes (Peter Fuhring, “The stocklist of Joannes Galle […]”, p. 228).
References: Hieronymus Cock, The Renaissance in Print, 2013; Peter Fuhring: “The stocklist of Joannes Galle, print publisher of Antwerp, and print sales from old copperplates in the seventeenth century”, in Simiolus, vol. 39, no. 3, 2017, pp. 225-309.
