Marine grotesques from Neuw Grottesken Buch

Christoph Jamnitzer was a Nuremberg goldsmith, draughtsman, and designer whose Neuw Grotteßken Buch, first published in Nuremberg in 1610, presented a sequence of ornamental designs for artists, goldsmiths, engravers, and other craftsmen. The book reflects the inventive early modern taste for grotesque ornament, in which human, animal, vegetal, architectural, and fantastical forms are combined into elaborate decorative compositions.

This set of four sheets contains sixteen small oval marine grotesques, with each sheet presenting four separate designs. The scenes include mermaids, mermen, winged putti, sea horses, fish, shells, reeds, hybrid creatures, and sea monsters. They are not narrative images, but ornamental inventions in which maritime life and imagined sea creatures are transformed into decorative motifs.