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The Last Supper

A work made of pen and brown ink, with brush and brown wash, heightened with touches of white opaque watercolor, over traces of black chalk, on cream laid paper, incised for transfer.
CC0 Public Domain Designation

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  • A work made of pen and brown ink, with brush and brown wash, heightened with touches of white opaque watercolor, over traces of black chalk, on cream laid paper, incised for transfer.

Date:

late 1613 or early 1614

Artist:

Peter Paul Rubens
Flemish, 1577–1640

About this artwork

This important drawing is one of a group of preparatory designs for a Roman Catholic prayer book (the Breviarium Romanum) that was reissued in 1614 under the new parameters of Counter-Reformation liturgy. This scene, in which Peter Paul Rubens placed the figure of Judas—instead of Christ—as center-most in the composition, preceded prayers celebrating the feast of Corpus Christi. The layered used of media and precise placement of compositional elements reflect Rubens’s intense desire to control the printed versions of his designs.

Status

Currently Off View

Department

Prints and Drawings

Artist

Peter Paul Rubens

Title

The Last Supper

Place

Flanders (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.

Made 1613–1614

Medium

Pen and brown ink, with brush and brown wash, heightened with touches of white opaque watercolor, over traces of black chalk, on cream laid paper, incised for transfer

Inscriptions

Inscribed verso of mount, upper left, in graphite: "246"; inscribed by Goll van Franckenstein, lower left, in pen and brown ink: "N 4050"; lower left, in graphite: "Rubens...(possible date)"; lower right, in graphite: "L (illegible) 1 6 / 20269702 1"

Dimensions

30.2 × 19.7 cm (11 15/16 × 7 13/16 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of Richard and Mary L. Gray

Reference Number

2022.94

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/202252/manifest.json

Extended information about this artwork

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email . Information about image downloads and licensing is available here.

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