The production of these panels was laborious, often requiring the specialized skills of draftsmen, glassmakers, and glass painters. The collaboration between these masters was made possible by drawings which conveyed not only the composition but also the colors to be used and the position of lead strips that held the pieces of glass in place.
Centered on the Museum’s recently acquired design for a painted glass window by Christoph Murer, Marks of Collaboration, on view through April 14, 2019, at the J. Paul Getty Museum, explores the remarkable partnership between 16th-century Swiss Renaissance designers and glass painters through a group of five drawings.
Murer’s Ecce Homo, King Caspar, the Virgin and Child, and the Arms of the Families Kündig and Pfyffer (1592) is an exquisite drawing that was made to scale for one of the 67 stained-glass windows that once decorated the Cistercian abbey of Rathausen. The window, which was painted by Franz Fallenter closely following Murer’s design, is now preserved in a Swiss private collection.
“With the acquisition of Ecce Homo, King Caspar, the Virgin and Child, and the Arms of the Families Kündig and Pfyffer (1592), we were inspired to take a closer look at the evidence of artistic collaboration—sometimes barely visible—on the surface of the paper,” says Edina Adam, curator of the installation.
Marks of Collaboration will be on view February 5 through April 14, 2019, at the J. Paul Getty Museum. The exhibition is curated by Edina Adam, assistant curator in the Department of Drawings.