Portraying the Republic of Letters: The Scholarly Clientele of Pieter Schenk I, Engraver

Description

Pieter Schenk I (1660 Elberfeld – 1711 Leipzig) was a prolific print-maker and publisher based in Amsterdam, catering to the English, German and Dutch markets. He specialised in the newly perfected technique of mezzotint, particularly suited for portraiture. In this contribution I study Schenk’s relation with his scholarly clients.
My argument is twofold. Firstly, I present the main document to Schenk’s life, his album amicorum. Autograph albums appeared in the 16th century as memorabilia of one’s student time. However, they became fundamental instruments for career advancement in academia during the 17th century. I contend that Schenk kept an album in the manner of scholars as a mean for self-fashioning and as a professional calling card. By cross-referencing the inscribers of his album and Schenk’s extant prints, I argue that the large majority of them actually sat for Schenk, and that the album was most likely signed while their likeness was being captured. This includes notorious academics, like Jean Leclerc (1657-1736), Jacques Basnage de Beuval (1653-1723) and Adriaan Reland (1676-1718).
Secondly, using the epistolary dataset of the SKILLNET project, I examine how the scholarly clients of Schenk were communicating among themselves, forming a small-world network. The overlap between the album inscribers and a clearly defined correspondence circuit shows how Schenk’s commercial strategy was successful: he targeted this closely-knitted clique relying on previous commissions and affecting erudite habits, like his autograph album, to project his persona as a scholarly portraitist. Thus, further light will be shed on how artists negotiated their place in the Republic of Letters around 1700.

Period	30 Dec 2018
Event title	Arts and Artists in the Republic of Letters: An International Graduate and Young Scholars Conference in memory of Yolanda de Man
Event type	Conference
Location	Tel Aviv, IsraelShow on map