Jan Saenredam
Dutch, 1565-1607
Plate Five, from Five Wise and Five Foolish Virgins
INV-4016
Jan Saenredam
Dutch, 1565-16071606
Plate Five, from Five Wise and Five Foolish Virgins
Jan Saenredam Dutch, 1565-1607 →engravingprint
Date
1606
Medium
Engraving on paper
Dimensions
Sheet, trimmed to platemark: 26.5 × 36.8 cm (10 7/16 × 14 1/2 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
William McCallin McKee Memorial Endowment
Jan Saenredam was a Netherlandish engraver, draftsman, and mapmaker. This engraving series illustrates a parable from the book of Matthew (25:1–13). Plate four (1972.790) shows a bridegroom emerging from a doorway marked with a Christological sculpture of a lamb. He admits five wise virgins carrying full oil lamps into his wedding feast, a metaphor for heaven. Five foolish virgins, who have wasted their oil in frivolous pursuits, beg the wise virgins to lend them oil so that they may also enter. Plate five reveals that these foolish virgins have been barred from the feast because, when they left to replenish their lamps, they returned too late.
Also notable
Works in the same vein
