Wilton album, folio 52b: The Annunciation
Ventura Salimbeni Italian
Not on view
On folio 52 with one other print: 27.78.1(176)
For more information on the Wilton album see entry for 27.78.1(1-428)
This etching, the last one to be dated by Salimbeni, is related to a large fresco the painter-etcher executed for the upper nave walls of the church of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome in 1593-94 (for which see Ciampolini 2010, p. 760). However, some details of the print are closer to two preparatory drawings for the composition: a figure study in the Biblioteca Comunale degli Intronati in Siena (inv. no. S.III.3, 14r c) and a second, more finished drawing of the whole composition, in reverse orientation, at the Louvre (inv. no. 1638r; 296 x 156 mm).
The plate was first published by the Rome-based Flemish publisher Statius, but the state of this strong impression is indeterminate because the lower margin with its inscriptions was trimmed off
