18.04.2009 - 19.07.2009
Overseas influence
For centuries, the Officina Plantiniana and other Antwerp presses exported a significant proportion of their output to the New World and other Spanish and Portuguese overseas territories. This exhibition looked at their considerable influence on and interaction with printing and visual culture in the overseas territories up to the 18th century.
Prints full of exoticism
The exhibition included the first prints of exotic plants and animals such as the cacao tree and the armadillo. These prints were often the first thing that Western Europeans saw from the overseas territories. The maps that scientists made of Latin America in the early 1700s are also particularly fascinating.
The Plantin-Moretus Museum arranged some unique loans from Portuguese and Spanish universities and libraries for the exhibition.
