AMORETTO FROM THE CEILING OF THE VILLA FARNESINA, LOGGIA DI PSICHE: [Set of fourteen copperplate etchings]

Paris: Chalcographie du Louvre, Musées Imperiaux., [c.1850].. Set of 14 copperplate etchings printed on laid paper, each numbered within the plate, untrimmed. Each plate measuring 28.5 x 22cm (sheet measuring 43.5 x 30.5cm) and with "Chalcographie du Louvre, Musées Imperiaux" blindstamp to the lower margin. Old collector's numbers in pencil to the blank bottom-right corners of the sheets. Condition is very good with some light scattered foxing and marking to the sheet margins, occasionally to the plates themselves, some marking to the head of sheet of no. 9 and 11, a 3cm tear to the blank foot of sheet of no. 5, and a 2cm tear to the blank top-left margin of sheet of no. 14 (framing would largely solve these relatively minor issues). The impressions remain crisp and sharp. A beautiful set of etchings by the French engraver Gérard Audran (1640-1703) reproducing frescoes by Raphael, printed from the original plates by the Louvre's chalcography workshop during the mid-nineteenth century.

In 1517, Agostino Chigi commissioned Raphael to decorate the ground floor loggia of the Villa Farnesina in Rome, in which the artist had painted his 'Galatea' a few years before. The series of frescoes which Raphael produced traced the story of Cupid and Psyche, a myth derived from the Golden Ass of Apuleius (2nd Century A.D.). The present set of etchings, first produced c.1662-1690, document each of the fourteen lunettes of the entrance loggia, depicting various cupids accompanied by the animals and other assorted attributes representative of the deities who had paid homage to Love.

The Chalcographie du Louvre was established in 1797 with the purpose of collecting and preserving engraved copperplates, as well as for establishing a workshop of skilled printers who would produce new impressions from the original plates on historic presses. Originally made up of the plates from Louis XIV's personal collection ('The King's Cabinet'), the Calcography went on to acquire several thousand further plates, and is still in operation today.