Description
St. James and the Magician Hermogenes brings a religious confrontation into a densely fantastic interior. A pale-robed standing figure with a staff faces a seated reader, while strange creatures crowd the surrounding space. A large opening in the foreground adds another unsettling element. The composition makes the encounter feel embedded in a world of disorder, with small incidents and unfamiliar forms competing for attention.
Pieter van der Heyden engraved the scene in 1565 after a design by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, and Hieronymus Cock published it. The story of the saint and magician offers the print a moral framework, but its visual energy comes from the elaborate contrast between the central figures and the creatures around them. Fine engraved lines make the crowded setting legible enough to explore, turning an encounter into an image that rewards repeated, close inspection.
Read our guide to giclée prints or browse the Pieter Bruegel collection.
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