Ornamental Design with Antique-style Mask 1550 - 1600

This small drawing of an antique-style mask is an ornamental design on paper. Because it is unsigned, we cannot know who made it or when. However, the very idea of ornament reflects a specific social need: the desire to decorate buildings and objects and so to broadcast a message about their owners’ wealth and taste. Here, an anonymous artist has chosen a classical motif. The mask and classical ornament were associated with ancient Greece and Rome. In Renaissance Europe, such images were used to communicate a patron’s erudition and sophistication, signalling their familiarity with the cultural achievements of the past. Such a drawing would have served as a model for reproduction in other media. It would have been an example to be copied and adapted. The museum as an institution plays an important role in this story because museums collect and preserve such drawings today, ensuring that this dialogue with the art of the past continues. Careful archival research could give us more clues.