Dürer to Goya: Old Master Prints at Winchester

The first prints appeared in Europe in the early fifteenth century. Artists discovered that ink applied to a carved wooden block, or to a metal plate with lines cut into it, could be used to make multiple copies of an image. The print soon became a essential part of visual culture, and, over time, new printmaking techniques were developed and introduced.

Prints often reproduced paintings or drawings but many were conceived as original designs. Some of the leading Western artists were printmakers as well as painters, including Dürer, Rembrandt and Goya. Most of the prints in this selection have been recently acquired by the school, from the endowment of John Sparrow (1906–1992) and a grant from the Friends of Winchester College.