John Skippe (1741-1812) Un apôtre debout. Vers 1780-1785. Bois gravé en clair-obscur d’après F. Mazzola, dit Le Parmesan (Parmigianino). 118 x 203. Nagler, Le Blanc 7. Impression en couleurs au moyen de trois blocs (beige saumon, marron et brun). Très belle épreuve sur vergé, rognée au trait carré et montée par l’artiste sur un feuillet provenant de l’un des albums constitués par lui (filigrane : J whatman et la date « 1801 »), avec l’onglet de montage d’origine au bord gauche. Petites cassures dans trait carré en tête (ce dernier légèrement incomplet en pied). « The last artist to produce traditional chiaroscuro woodcuts in any great number was the eighteenth-century English collector and amateur, John Skippe. […] Skippe began to experiment with the chiaroscuro technique in 1770. […] In the 1780s Skippe began to publish bound folios of his chiaroscuro woodcuts. The woodcuts were made after Old Master drawings ; most, if not all, were from his own collection, probably acquired in Italy some time between 1773 and 1781. The majority of these works are of religious or mythological subjects after Renaissance or Baroque masters, including Raphael, Parmigianino, Guercino, and Rubens. He had hoped to gain public recognition for this work, but the folios were distributed only among his friends and never garnered a large enough audience to warrant commercial publication. » (Barbara Bays, « John Skippe », in Beyond Black and White, Chiaroscuro Prints from Indiana Collections, Indiana University Art Museum, Bloomington, Indiana, 1989, p. 130).