December 16, 1946
Giovanni Battista Piranesi’s set of etchings of the Carceri, (the Prisons), in the extremely rare first edition of fourteen plates from the Museum’s own collection, is current in the small Print Gallery from December 17 thru February 23, 1947. Published by Bouchard between 1745-1750, the set received little notice and, in 1761, Piranesi reworked all the plates, adding two more to the original series. It has been said that the early edition of “The Prisons” is, perhaps, the most clean-cut example of space composition to be found in the entire range of the graphic arts.
Piranesi, born in Venice in 1720, worked as an architect in Rome, where he died in 1778.
Brooklyn Museum Archives. Records of the Department of Public Information. Press releases, 1942 - 1946. 10-12/1946, 152. View Original
