Artwork Page for Head of an Oriental

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Head of an Oriental

1600s

Jan Lievens

(Dutch, 1607–1674)
Culture
Netherlands
Medium
etching
Credit Line
Gift of The Print Club of Cleveland 1921.173
Catalogue raisonné
Hollstein XI.34.35
Public Domain
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Location
Not on view
Print

Description

As Europeans more actively engaged in sea travel and trade in the 1600s, references to distant locales became popular among artists. This is one of a series of head studies of men in Turkish costume created by Jan Lievens in the 1630s. He sketched this bearded, turbaned man loosely but with precise details, such as the paisley pattern, a traditional Persian design, on his scarf. While making this print, Lievens shared a studio with Rembrandt, and the artists’ shared a mutual emphasis on sketching freely with an etching needle.
A vertically oriented etching in black ink on cream paper depicts a man with a light skin tone in profile, facing left. He wears a large turban with a long drape. Shaded with dense hatching, his wrinkled face and tangled beard emerge from shadow. Light catches his forehead and the turban front. To the left, loose lines suggest a rocky embankment beside etched letters I L. He is shown from the shoulders up.

Head of an Oriental

1600s

Jan Lievens

(Dutch, 1607–1674)
Netherlands

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