The Art of Wenceslas Hollar
Some three hundred years ago, when the English Civil War was brewing, a gifted Bohemian artist settled in London; Joseph Bradac writes that we owe much to his talents.
We have heard that Wenceslas Hollar very carefully drew and engraved in copper a large map of our city of London and her suburbs... and therefore we recommend you, the Council, and all wealthy citizens to support him, so as to be able to finish this exact... plan of our city.”
With these words, Charles II presented the Czech engraver in 1660 to Thomas Allyn, Lord Mayor of London. Three centuries later, one of his drawings has appeared on a British stamp, with the head of the reigning monarch.
Hollar was born in Prague on July 13th, 1607, son of Jan Hollar, a high official of the provincial legislature, and his wife, Margaret. The boy was named after “Good King Wenceslas”, patron saint of Bohemia. At that time, Prague was one of the principal cities in the Empire of Rudolf II of Hapsburg.
The Emperor was, of course, Catholic, but the Hollars, Protestant. Prague was a great centre of art. The galleries of its noble castle contained treasures subsequently dispersed, by the fortunes of war, to Stockholm, Vienna, London, Paris, Antwerp, Munich, Berlin, Dresden, New York, and Leningrad.
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