Between 1532 and 1536 37 the Dutch artist Maarten van Heemskerck traveled to Rome strolled
through the city visited art collections and antique gardens made pilgrimages to the holy
sites and filled his sketchbook with drawings. Most of the sheets created there and now kept
in Berlin come from a sketchbook whose original binding has been lost. The latest
art-technological investigations at the Berlin Kupferstichkabinett have now largely
reconstructed the original sequence of the book's pages. This forms the basis of the present
facsimile. In his fascinating studies Van Heemskerck captured ancient sculptures and ruins
the admired art of Michelangelo and Raphael and Roman cityscapes. In doing so he demonstrated
a special flair for composition and perspective as well as an extraordinary drawing
sensibility. In the sketchbook the artist found his personal field of experimentation and at
the same time created a valuable pool of motifs from which he would draw throughout his life.
Tatjana Bartsch has been Deputy Head of the Photographic Collection at the Bibliotheca
Hertziana - Max Planck Institute for Art History since 2011. Christien Melzer has been
curator for Dutch and English art before 1800 at the Kupferstichkabinett of the Staatliche
Museen zu Berlin since 2020.
