Image Not Available
for Daniel Hopfer
Daniel Hopfer
c. 1470 - 1536
CountryGermany
Biography(From the British Museum Database, 11/15/11)Bibliography
E. Eyssen, 'Daniel Hopfer von Kaufbeuren: Meister zu Augsburg 1493 bis 1536', Heidelberg, 1904; Thieme-Becker, xvii, 1924, pp. 474ff; S. V. Grancsay, 'Armor with Etching Attributed to Daniel Hopfer', 'Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art', xxxiv, New York, 1939, pp.190ff.; R.A. Vogler, The Hopfers of Augsburg: Sixteenth-century etchers, exhib. cat., Los Angeles, UCLA Dickson Art Center, 14 Nov. - 11 Dec. 1966; Augsburg, Umbruch, ii, pp. 246ff.; Hollstein, xv, 1986, pp. 33ff; C.Metzger et al, 'Daniel Hopfer: ein Augsburger Meister der Renaissance: Eisenradierungen, Holzschnitte, Zeichnungen, Waffenätzungen' exhibition catalogue, Munich, Pinakothek der Moderne, 2009-2010.
Biography
Son of the painter Bartholomäus Hopfer of Kaufbeuren in Swabia, Daniel became a citizen of Augsburg in 1493 and is recorded as a master painter in the same year. Worked as an armourer in Augsburg. He was the earliest artist to adapt the practice of etching on iron to printmaking and to make a significant profession out of it. He produced 145 etchings and his sons, Hieronymus (c.1500-63) and Lambert (active c. 1525-50), continued the family reputation as etchers for a generation in Augsburg and Nuremberg. Daniel also designed a few woodcuts, chiefly ornamental borders for book illustrations (Hollstein, 146-155). In 1524 the Emperor Charles V conferred on Hopfer a coat of arms for his "true accomplishments in the service of the Emperor and Empire" (Eyssen, p. 37). He was an active supporter of the Reformation.
The Hopfers signed the majority of their prints with a device resembling a fir-cone, the emblem of Augsburg. Many of their iron plates were reprinted at least twice: 230 plates were reissued, with numbers added, in the seventeenth century by David Funck at Nuremberg, and in 1802 ninety-two plates were published by C.Wilhelm Silberburg at Frankfurt (British Museum, inv. nos. 1940,0810.20(1/92)). The existence of certain numbered impressions on good sixteenth-century paper has also been noted (see T. Falk in Hollstein, p. 5). For this reason, Hopfer prints are not uncommon and they still frequently appear on the art market. The survival of thirty-four of Daniel Hopfer's iron plates is recorded in Hollstein; twenty-four in Berlin (Kupferstichkabinett), and one in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (Hollstein, 74).
Person TypeIndividual
