3-016-022 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Jesus Christ. Plate 12. From: Christ and the Apostles, 1548. This is the twelfth of 14 engravings depicting Christ, St Paul and the Twelve Apostles. Alone of the prints, Christ is not placed in an architectural setting and again, unlike all the Apostles, who are viewed in various profile vantage points, he is rigorously frontal, formal and symmetrical, surrounded by a mandorla of clouds. The eyeballs are left blank, the effect of which, like the plinth on which he stands, is to suggest classical statuary. Above all, the print aims to emphasise Christ's divinity.