Quodlibet with Goldfinch

This illusionistic, hand-colored German etching presents several of the most popular and ephemeral printmaking products—genre pictures, maps, playing cards, religious texts, and wall calendars—tacked to a wall with paste or daubs of wax. Prints mounted in this manner were used for decorating, devotion, entertainment, or study, and the practice is depicted in fifteenth- and sixteenth-century paintings of the interiors of taverns and private homes. Renaissance viewers even used them on ceilings, furniture, or more portable supports such as boards, boxes, and fabric. This late-eighteenth-century work suggests that the practice continued long after.