Saint Catherine of Alexandria

A draped female figure stands on a shattered wooden wheel and clouds, holding a sword in her left hand and a palm frond in her right. Her cloak billows around her, and the hatched lines and soft tonal shading suggest a dark-ink etching on pale paper.

Look closer: A small tangle of clouds and a broken wheel at the lower left, partly hidden in shadow.

Artist

Peter Paul Rubens

Date

ca. 1620

Medium

Etching, counterproof of the first state of three, with corrections in pen and brown ink and black chalk

Source

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Size

2429 × 3585 px

Credit (appreciated, not required for public-domain works): The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1922