The Music Making Couple

Prints and Drawings

1470/80

Monogrammist b. g.
German, active c. 1470–90

Enjoying an intimate garden tête-à-tête, this well-dressed couple is wealthy enough to afford the leisure time to make beautiful music together. The walled garden enclave suggests that they have stolen away from a busy castle for a little privacy. The closed garden, or hortus conclusus, was often seen as an emblem of purity, especially in images of the Virgin Mary and infant Christ. Yet this woman’s studied attempt to avoid the man’s appraising glance suggests that they both have other things on their mind than playing instruments.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Prints and Drawings

Artist: Monogrammist b. g.
Title: The Music Making Couple
Place: Germany (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1470–1480
Medium: Round engraving on ivory laid paper
Dimensions: Plate: H.: 8.9 cm (3 9/16 in.); Sheet: 9.5 × 9.2 cm (3 3/4 × 3 5/8 in.)
Credit Line: Amanda S. Johnson and Marion J. Livingston Endowment
Reference Number: 2000.408
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/155251/manifest.json

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Place

Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

Learn more.