Diogenes

Unknown artist

The philosopher Diogenes is shown here with a plucked chicken, which he displayed as a facetious response to Plato’s definition of man as a featherless biped. Quite exceptionally, Ugo da Capri did not use a line block for this impressive chiaroscuro woodcut. This masterpiece was printed with four tone blocks, indicating both the light and dark areas and the outlines.