Matching fingerprints on sculptures by the “Bernini of the North”

Human impressions are found on artworks made in a wide variety of media. In this paper, a pipeline is presented to collect images of preserved human impressions discovered on eight terracotta sculptures made in the Amsterdam workshop of Artus Quellinus the Elder (Antwerp 1609–Antwerp 1668), as well as a best-practice forensic workflow for the examination of such impressions. We provide the anatomical provenance of such marks (palm or finger, left or right hand), document matched pairs of fingerprints, and offer a database with images of all marks. In total, 28 fingerprints, nine palmprints, and three groups of partial and fragmentary marks originating from fingers were discovered. Four matched pairs of fingerprints were identified, consisting of impressions from the master’s right and left hands. Considering the unique information they hold, our aim is to introduce the study of human impressions on artworks as an independent field of research.