NEW YORK—In March 1455, Enea Silvio Piccolomini, later Pope Pius II, reported seeing pages of a Bible that had such neat lettering one could read it without glasses. The Germanic Gothic-style typeface had been cast in metal by printer Johann Gutenberg, who set each character line by line, inked and then printed the Latin Vulgate in his Mainz workshop, creating the first substantial mass-produced book in the Western world. From May 20 through the end of September, visitors to New York’s Morgan Library?bespectacled and otherwise—will have the chance to compare all three (one printed on vellum, two on paper) of the institution’s Gutenberg Bibles. Only 50 of an estimated 130 copies have survived. Once the 1,282 sheets per volume were pulled, specialized craftsmen rubricated and illuminated them by hand, presenting viewers with a dynamic study of variations and replication. “You think of technical innovation as a gradual and imperfect process, but when you look at printing, the inventor got it right the first time,” notes Morgan curator John Bidwell. “The Gutenberg Bible sets extraordinary standards.”

"Bible Study" originally appeared in the June 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction's June 2008 Table of Contents.