Recreating a 15th-century woodblock for the Gutenberg Museum
the annunciation page
The finished cherry wood block for the Gutenberg Museum
In 2025, Prelo Prints was commissioned by the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz to create a new woodblock inspired by a page of its Biblia Pauperum, one of the most remarkable surviving examples of early European block-book printing.
The finished block is now part of the museum's collection and is displayed alongside the historic Biblia Pauperum in the museum's treasury in Mainz, Germany,
and helps visitors understand the process behind the printing of block books.
The block was made from cherry wood, a material I use extensively in my contemporary woodcut practice.
The work began with preparing the wooden block and transferring the drawing. From there, the image was gradually cut by hand, using traditional woodcut tools.
The finished block represents approximately 100 hours of work:
The 82 hours of cutting were spread over 61 days.
Working on a block for this length of time creates a very different relationship with an image from the one we have today. A digital image can be copied, enlarged, corrected, or discarded in seconds, while a woodblock demands the opposite: every cut is physical, deliberate, and irreversible.
The Biblia Pauperum, or "Poor Man's Bible", is a 40-page block book probably produced in southern Germany around 1460–64. Unlike books printed with movable type, block books were made by cutting the complete page – images and text – into a single wooden block and printing it manually onto paper.
The Gutenberg Museum describes its Biblia Pauperum as an exceptionally well-preserved and unusually complete example of this early form of printing. It is one of three block books in the museum's collection and is displayed in the treasury alongside some of the institution's most important treasures.
For this commission, I recreated Page 2 of the book, the Annunciation, as a new wooden printing block.
Photo of the original book © Gutenberg Museum Mainz
The block was completed at the beginning of April 2026 and delivered to the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz in July 2026.
The museum is one of the world's oldest museums devoted to printing and houses an exceptional collection covering the history of books, writing, printing, and graphic techniques. Its Biblia Pauperum is presented in the treasury as part of the museum's story of the transition from manuscript culture to early printed books.
The block now belongs to a collection dedicated to preserving, studying, and communicating the history of printing, and sits alongside the very object that inspired its creation.
Photo © Gutenberg Society, Markus Kohz
Commission: Gutenberg Museum, Mainz
Work: Biblia Pauperum, Page 2 – Annunciation
Material: Cherry wood
Dimensions: approx. 27 × 20 cm
Total working time: approx. 100 hours
Cutting time: 82 hours
Completed: April 2026
Artist: Jorge Lar / Prelo Prints
The Biblia Pauperum project sits at the centre of what I do at Prelo Prints: looking back to understand the craft, and then using that knowledge to make something new.
More than five centuries later, woodcut print is a craft that is still alive and is perhaps more important today than ever. In an increasingly (and sometimes overwhelming) digital world, there is something meaningful about creating something slowly, deliberately, and entirely by hand.
Keeping the crafts alive.
Photos © Prelo Prints
Prelo Prints is a project born from the love for letterpress and all forms of early print, its techniques, and history.
© Prelo Prints 2026
CVR 45899608
