Pilate, ca. 1598 – 1600

About the Work

Owing in part to its quotations from the Renaissance art of Lucas van Leyden and Albrecht Dürer, Goltzius’s Passion series was considered an exemplary and classic work. This circumstance is also expressed in the copy drawn by the young Peter Paul Rubens after the engraving Christ before Pilate. The copying process served Rubens as a means of reflecting on the original. He concentrated on the group around Pilate, and particularly on the discerning gaze. To this end, he shifted the two heads at the right to a somewhat higher position. Opposite Pilate, in the place of Jesus, are two heads from the engraving Christ before Caiaphas.