Jacques Callot

French engraver and painter

• Born: 1592
• Birthplace: Nancy, France
• Died: March 25, 1635
• Place of death: Nancy, France

Callot’s technical innovations revolutionized etching and transformed it into an independent art. Etching became the preferred print medium of famous artists such as Rembrandt and Francisco Goya. Callot’s genius was recognized during his lifetime, and his prints were sought after by art collectors and wealthy patrons.

Early Life

Jacques Callot (zhahk kah-loh) was the son of Jean Callot, a courtier of the duke of Lorraine, Charles III, who was responsible for organizing and overseeing the court’s festivities. When the duke died in 1608, Jean supervised the pompous funerary ceremonies. These activities integrated theatrical, visual, and musical components, proving an excellent introduction to the world of the arts for the young Callot.

In 1607, Callot began an apprenticeship in the shop of a Nancy medalist and goldsmith. In that year he produced his first signed print, an engraving portraying Duke Charles. It is not known whether Callot completed his apprenticeship, which would have lasted four years. It is quite possible that during the autumn of 1608 he moved to Rome; he was certainly there in 1611, working for the engraver Philippe Thomassin. In the eternal city, he came in direct contact with and was influenced by Antonio Tempesta and Francesco Villamena, two accomplished graphic artists. Among their various collaborative projects, Callot helped Tempesta with the series of prints commissioned for the funeral of the queen of Spain. For Thomassin, Callot reproduced several series of prints by famous artists, including The Seasons, engraved by Johan Sadeler after the sixteenth century paintings of Jacopo Bassano. Generally, Callot’s 1611 prints demonstrate the progressive confidence he gained in handling the burin—the tool used to engrave copper plates. At the end of 1611, he traveled to Florence to deliver prints he had produced with Tempesta, and in Florence he remained.

Life’s Work

Callot worked independently in Florence, becoming a Medici court artist formally in October of 1614. He was given a studio in the Uffizi and a generous monthly stipend, a salaried position that freed him from having to produce works for the art market and allowed him to concentrate on more creative projects. During his time in Florence, he made his most important prints, including the following series: The Life of Ferdinand de’ Medici, The Caprices , The War of Love , and The War of Beauty . The latter two prints represent court festivals directed by Giulio Parigi. Also from this period are Callot’s famous single prints, such as his first version of The Temptation of Saint Anthony , and finished drawings that would inspire the rest of his career.

The technical and artistic innovations presented in these prints are numerous, and they had a profound influence on graphic artists for centuries after Callot’s time. Although etching was a technique developed around 1510 and successfully employed by masters such as Albrecht Dürer and Parmigianino, Callot devised several solutions that virtually revolutionized etching, expanding its range of expressiveness and making it the preferred graphic mode of expression for Rembrandt and Goya.

Callot’s three crucial innovations include the instrument used to make the incisions, the preparation of the ground, and the perfecting of the multiple “biting” process, that is, the multiple immersions of the incised coated plate into an acid bath. His first innovation—the incising instrument—was developed out of Callot’s interest in achieving the same variation in the breadth of the incised line procured by the rotation of the burin in engravings. To produce a swelling and tapering line, Callot replaced the etching needle with an instrument that had an oval-shaped point, allowing the needle to modulate the width of the furrow. Realizing line virtuosity depended upon Callot’s new mixture for coating the copper plate. In fact, only a ground harder than the one that was commonly in use would have avoided cracks and retained the incised marks with precision. Thus, for his second innovation—preparing the ground—he substituted the traditional wax-based ground for one made of oil and mastic, similar to the varnish used by lute makers. His third innovation—perfecting the multiple biting of the etched plate—was a way to create printed lines of different intensity: Those lines etched last and exposed only to the last biting would be soft. Inked lines were created through repeatedly exposing the etched lines to acid baths, because the acid deepens the furrows. The deeper furrows, in turn, would retain more ink and thereby create a blacker line.

The etchings Callot produced in the early 1600’s were revolutionary also from an artistic perspective: At this time his innovations concerned the character of the line, the rendition of space, and the choice of subject. Recalling painter Il Guercino’s (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri) nervous strokes but maintaining a measured command of the line, Callot’s etching style mixed spontaneity and academic virtuosity, eloquently demonstrating that a small number of marks is sufficient not only to define a figure but also to perfectly capture its character. Thus, the vivacity of his line infuses energy into figures and their surrounding, while the economy of his line allows for minute silhouettes to live next to the monumental figures without losing their identity.

Rather than simply filling space, the multitude of minuscule figures that populates Callot’s prints delights the beholder, inviting him or her to peruse the print. This appreciation of prints reflects Callot’s choice of not pursuing a powerful Baroque naturalism, which often requires the viewer to empathize with the scene portrayed. On the contrary, Callot intended his audience to remain emotionally detached so that he could represent charged subjects without being offensive or moralistic. This is epitomized by the prints in the famous series titled Miseries of War , published in 1633. In these prints the artist depicts with detached but poignant naturalism the horrific deeds of soldiers killing, raping, and pillaging; he documents timeless truths while exposing the dark side of human nature. Callot’s creation of a detached but privileged position for the viewer of his etchings is predicated on an accurate construction of perspective. His compositions incorporate a distant theatrical space that is separated from the immediate foreground; this latter is often defined by a boundary figure with whom the beholder shares the view of the main scene presented at a distance.

Callot lost his Medici court appointment in 1621, following the death of Grand Duke Cosimo II de’ Medici. He returned to Nancy, where he struggled for more than a year despite producing his best, and certainly most famous, print series, the Gobbi and Other Bizarre Figures (hunchbacks) and Balli di Sfessania (Sfessania dances). The Gobbi and Other Bizarre Figures are comic depictions of dwarfs and hunchbacks with grotesque faces, and the Balli di Sfessania represent pairs of figures from the commedia dell’arte. Beginning in 1623, Callot received the patronage of Henry II, the duke of Lorraine, and in the following years, as his fame grew, he accepted commissions from many important dignitaries, including Louis XIII , the king of France. Most of these commissions were large, celebratory scenes, most often sieges, military victories, or court festivals.

In 1635, Callot produced his second version of The Temptation of Saint Anthony, considered by many to be his final masterwork. This large print embodies all of his technical innovations, and it perfectly displays his artistic mastery of etching. The scene is set in a deep space that is given an atmospheric perspective, and it is populated by innumerable minute and several large demoniac creatures; despite their monstrous appearance, they do not threaten but instead delight the beholder. The beholder can safely peruse the creatures’ horrific shapes and actions because the expansive center ground, where the action is taking place, is framed by a backlighted, rocky cornice closer to the viewer’s perceived space. Callot, by this time a famous etcher with more than fourteen hundred prints bearing his signature, died shortly after The Temptation of Saint Anthony was finished.

Significance

Jacques Callot was the first artist to achieve international fame producing prints alone. Baroque connoisseurs recognized his inventive genius; they equally appreciated his mastery of the technical aspects of etching. His achievements and his legacy perhaps are best measured by recognizing the debts owed to Callot by the greatest etchers who followed him. Although he had accomplished followers by the middle of the seventeenth century, including Stefano della Bella, Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione, and Salvator Rosa, his best students remain Rembrandt and, in the nineteenth century, Goya. Rembrandt learned and expanded the range of Callot’s technical subtleties, and he also found inspiration in Callot’s Caprices. Goya’s fame as a graphic artist derives primarily from his emulation of Callot’s Miseries of War, which influenced his own Disasters of War, an even more moving series of prints.

Bibliography

Howard, Daniel. Callot’s Etchings. New York: Dover, 1974. An excellent introduction to the artist’s most famous prints.

Hults, Linda. The Print in the Western World: An Introductory History. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1996. Clear and comprehensive guide to the history of printmaking, with a section on printing techniques and processes. Extensive bibliography.

Jacques Callot, 1592-1635. Nancy, France: Musée Historique Lorrain, 1992. An exhibition catalog dedicated to the artist, with hundreds of fine reproductions of his prints and drawings.

Kahan, Gerald. Jacques Callot: Artist of the Theater. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1976. A short but good introduction to the art of Callot’s etchings.

Lieure, Jules. Jacques Callot. 2 vols. San Francisco, Calif.: Alan Wofsy Fine Arts, 1989. The reference catalogue raisonné for the artist’s oeuvre. Includes chronology and biography.

Pellegrini, Franca. Capricci Gobbi Amore Guerra e Bellezza. Padua, Italy: Il Poligrafo, 2002. An exhibition catalog on the artist with an insightful introductory essay and other entries.

Reed, Sue Welsch, and Richard Wallace. Italian Etchers of the Renaissance and Baroque. Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1989. Exhibition catalog that is useful for its comparative material. Includes a separate section on Callot. Extensive bibliography.

Russel, Diane H. Jacques Callot: Prints and Related Drawings. Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1975. Organized thematically, this exhibition catalog is perhaps the best volume in English on the artist.