Théodore de Bèze (1519-1605 ) was a prominent French Calvinist theologian. His Icones consists of two parts: the first is a gallery of notable religious figures who contributed to the Reformation, including Luther, Calvin and Erasmus. Presented in woodcut portraits and brief biographies, the gallery invites interaction by leaving frames blank for figures whose portraits are not available at the time, but will be available after the book’s publication. Interestingly the backs of the engravings cut out and pasted in by the reader reveal that they were cut out of other books published close to the same time period. This method of adding prints from other source establish this copy of Icones is extra-illustrated, as other items in this exhibition are (see Camden, Stow, and Radcliffe). Additional scraps of paper are attached to the engravings and empty engraved frames and are filled with sketches made by one of the book’s owners copying an extant portrait of a distinguished religious reformer.
The second portion of the book presents the 44 emblems that make Icones a notable example of the early modern emblem book genre. Emblem books set words and images into interplay with each other by presenting a mysterious visual icon or image with an accompanying epigram or motto. While the first section of the book, with its visual parade of illustrious religious leaders, appears disconnected from the emblems, the first few, which present images of frames with landscapes that surround empty spaces in which a circle floats, suggest what the connection might be. The epigram beneath the first emblem presents its circle as a picture both of eternal life and God’s perfection, suggesting that by focusing on the image in front of them, and following the subsequent emblems to the end, the reader might enact the circular path of eternity. Through applying the idea of God’s eternity to one’s own life, one might place oneself inside the space of the circle that is in turn surrounded by a frame. In this way the emblem book portion of Icones picks up on the interactive possibilities of its portraits, which similarly invite the reader’s “input” by leaving some of its spaces intentionally blank for their own reflection.