WASHINGTON D.C.—The National Gallery of Art has bought the complete first edition of Albrecht Dürer’s storied 16 woodcuts depicting the Apocalypse, reports the New York Times. Peter Parshall, curator of old master prints at the museum, said of the 1498 edition, “This is to printmaking what the Sistine Chapel is to the history of mural painting." The work was followed by a second edition in 1511, less esteemed by experts.

The recent purchase makes the National Gallery one of only four U.S. institutions to own a first edition, according to Parshall. The other sets are at the St. Louis Museum of Art, the Houghton Library at Harvard University, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

As for the details of the exchange, Parshall declined to identify the dealer or the price, stating simply that the museum bought the woodcuts from a European dealer. Print experts, on the other hand, claim the seller was Laube & Company of Zurich and that the asking price was around $1.4 million.