La Taille et le Trait: Exchanges between Drawing and Print (15th–18th century).

In his Dictionnaire des monogrammes (1747), Johann Friedrich Christ praises the invention of printmaking as follows: “this admirable technique enables us to multiply by the thousands the design one has engraved and that without it would always remain unique and one of a kind”. Yet, far from being limited to a mere relation of subordination in which print simply reproduces and multiplies drawing, these two mediums have developed different types of interactions that redefine the ways art is conceived, produced, and shared. It seems essential, therefore, to question the boundaries established by overly restrictive approaches that place the concepts of original and copy, of invention and reproduction, in opposition, and to rethink the common assumption of a unidirectional orientation in the transmedial phenomena at play at the intersection of drawing and printmaking. Indeed, the shared history of the two mediums reveals much more sophisticated dynamics. From preparatory drawing to interpretative print, from the print as model to the drawings that take inspiration from it, from hybrid practices to the design freely sketched on the plate in order to be printed, these two arts engage in a constant dialogue that encompasses issues ranging from technique, to authoriality, and the circulation of images.

Thirteen years after the scholarly contributions brought together by Dominique Cordellier et Cordélia Hattori under the title Dessiner pour graver, graver pour dessiner, this colloquium is part of a major critical renewal of the study of the graphic arts. The analysis of hybrid practices and of the translation between mediums sheds light on the creative process in its full complexity. What becomes of the notions of invention and reproduction when the print is itself a creative source? To what extent do the technique-specific constraints of printmaking influence the style and compositional strategies of drawing? What role does collaboration between designers and printmakers play in the creation of a shared visual language? This colloquium aims to explore such questions by combining historical, technical, and aesthetic approaches, to advance the study of the interwoven relationships between the draftsman’s mark and the printmaker’s groove between the 15th and the 18th centuries.

PROGRAM

18 NOVEMBER 2026

9:00 am - Welcome
9:30 am - Introduction

Session 1 - Collaborative practices
Chair: Ulysse Jardat (Musée Condé, Institut de France)

10:00 am - Rhoda Eitel-Porter (journal Print Quarterly)
The Priest, the Pope, the Publisher, the Printmaker & His Wife

10:20 am - Christien Melzer (Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin)
Creative Collaborations – Maarten van Heemskerck’s Preparatory Drawings for Prints and his Engravers / Etchers

10:40 am - Jina Han (Universiteit Leiden)
Reading Between the Lines: Johannes Galle and the Construction of Authorship in Seventeenth-Century Printmaking

11:00 am - Q&A
11:15 am - Coffee break

11:30 am - Julien Muraille (Université de Liège)
Quand le graveur transforme l’invention : dessins, gravures et contraintes matérielles dans le Groot Schilderboek de Gérard de Lairesse

11:50 am - Marianne Paunet (Sabrier & Paunet)
Les débuts de Jean Mariette comme éditeur d’estampes (1690-1700) : dessinateurs, graveurs et sources visuelles

12:10 pm - Johanna Daniel (Institut national d’Histoire de l’Art)
Graver les Voyages pittoresques à la fin du XVIIIe siècle

12:30 pm - Q&A
12:45 pm - Lunch break

Session 2 - Image circulation
Chair: Emmanuelle Brugerolles (Beaux-Arts de Paris, Cabinet Jean-Bonna)

2:00 pm - Aude Briau (École pratique des Hautes Études / Universität Heidelberg)
La plume et le burin. Copies dessinées d’après les gravures de Martin Schongauer

2:20 pm - Lorenzo Giammattei (Sapienza Università di Roma)
Godfried Maes as Draughtsman and the Metamorphoses of Ovid: Drawings, Copies, and Prints in the Banier Edition (1732)

2:40 pm - Jean-Gérald Castex (Musée du Louvre)
Les dessins du Cabinet du roi gravés par le comte de Caylus

3:00 pm - Q&A
3:15 pm - Coffee break

Session 3 - Collecting practices
Chair: Sophie Raux (Université Lyon 2, LARHRA)

3:45 pm - Maria Gabriella Matarazzo (Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte)
Raphael in Black and White: Vincenzo Vittoria’s Collection of Prints and Drawings

4:05 pm - Pierre Husson (Fondation Custodia)
Feuilles préparatoires ou pièces de collection ? Le statut des dessins et des états de gravure dans le livre illustré en France au XVIIIe siècle

4:30 pm - Antoine Gallay (Université de Lausanne)
Les recueils hybrides au XVIIIe siècle et l’émergence d’une approche pragmatique du processus créatif

4:50 pm - Q&A

19 NOVEMBER 2026

Session 4 - Transmedial practices
Chair: Hélène Gasnault (Beaux-Arts de Paris, Cabinet Jean-Bonna)

10:00 am - Dario Donetti (Università di Verona)
Antiquity in Monochrome: Du Cerceau’s Architectural Inventions across Drawing and Print

10:20 am - Georges Farhat (University of Toronto)
On Paper, Vellum, or Copper: Du Cerceau's Transmedial Approach to Perspective

10:40 am - Q&A
11:05 am - Coffee break

11:20 am - Audrey Adamczak (Sorbonne Université)
Crayon - burin - pastel : un jeu à trois ou la maîtrise de l’intermédialité chez Robert Nanteuil, dessinateur et graveur du Roi

11:40 am - Alice Ottazzi (Italian Academy, Gerda Henkel Foundation Fellow in the History of Art)
Matter at Work. Thinking the Interplay of Prints and Drawings in the 18th Century

12:00 pm - Q&A
12:15 pm - Lunch break

Session 5 - Hybrid objects
Chair: Maël Tauziède-Espariat (Université Paris Nanterre)

2:00 pm - Vanessa Selbach (Bibliothèque nationale de France)
Estampes à moitié gravées à moitié dessinées : une ou plusieurs mains ? Le cas d'Abraham Bosse

2:20 pm - Ester Giachetti (Ca' Foscari / École normale supérieure de la rue d’Ulm)
À travers le papier : la collection des dessins transparents de Nicolas Vleughels (1668-1737)

2:40 pm - Q&A
3:00 pm - Conclusion
3:15 pm - Coffee break

Session 6 - Workshop
Chairs: Pauline Chougnet (Bibliothèque nationale de France), Edina Adam (The J. Paul Getty Museum), Jamie Gabbarelli (The Art Institute of Chicago), Vanessa Selbach (Bibliothèque nationale de France) et Lila Wickers-Lévy (Bibliothèque nationale de France)

3:30-5:00 pm - Session reserved for conference speakers.

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Organizing committee
Edina Adam, associate curator of drawings (J. Paul Getty Museum)
Antoine Chatelain, doctoral candidate in history of art (Université Lyon 2 / LARHRA)
Pauline Chougnet, curator of drawings (Bibliothèque nationale de France)
Jamie Gabbarelli, associate curator of prints and drawings (The Art Institute of Chicago)
Nastasia Gallian, associate professor (Sorbonne Université / Centre André-Chastel UMR 8150)
Chloé Perrot, curator (Musée Condé, Institut de France)

Advisory committee
Emmanuelle Brugerolles, curator emerita (ENSBA, Cabinet Jean-Bonna)
Maël Tauziède-Espariat, associate professor in the History of Modern Art (Université Paris Nanterre)
Sophie Raux, professor in the History of Modern Art (Université Lyon 2 / LARHRA)
Philippe Sénéchal, emeritus professor in the History of Modern Art (Université de Picardie Jules Verne)
Caroline Vrand, curator (Musée du Louvre)

Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France
Site Richelieu, salle des conférences
5 rue Vivienne 75002 Paris

Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/95348256393
Contact: latailleetletraitgmail.com

This colloquium builds on recent research on the graphic arts and is supported by the Tavolozza Foundation, Sorbonne University / Centre André-Chastel UMR 8150, the LARHRA UMR 5190, the Comité national de l'EStampe, and the Bibliothèque nationale de France.