Self-Portrait at Twenty-Eight (1500)
Alte Pinakothek, Munich
Frontal, symmetrical pose deliberately recalling images of Christ
No free image available (likely still in copyright) · see it on Wikipedia
Art
Albrecht Dürer
1471–1528 · German
Northern Renaissance
Albrecht Dürer of Nuremberg was the greatest artist of the German Renaissance, bringing Italian ideas of proportion and perspective north after visits to Venice. A painter, theorist and above all a supreme printmaker, his engravings and woodcuts spread his fame across Europe in his lifetime.
How to spot them
- ▸Incredibly fine engraved or woodcut line, dense with symbolic objects
- ▸His famous 'AD' monogram, a large A with a small D inside it
- ▸Meticulous nature studies in watercolour — a hare, a clump of turf
- ▸Quiz clue: 'Nuremberg', 'Meisterstiche', 'magic square', 'Christ-like self-portrait', 'rhinoceros he never saw'
Key works
Young Hare (1502)
Albertina, Vienna
Watercolour and bodycolour study of astonishing realism; a window is reflected in the hare's eye
Image: Albrecht Dürer · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Praying Hands (c. 1508)
Albertina, Vienna
Study for an apostle's hands in the lost Heller Altarpiece
Image: Albrecht Dürer · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Knight, Death and the Devil (1513)
Engraving; impressions in many collections
First of the three Meisterstiche (master prints)
Image: Albrecht Dürer · CC0, Wikimedia Commons
Melencolia I (1514)
Engraving; impressions in many collections
Brooding winged figure with a magic square whose bottom row includes the date 1514
Image: Albrecht Dürer · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Rhinoceros (1515)
Woodcut; impressions in many collections
Made from a description of an animal he never saw, shown with armour plates
Image: Albrecht Dürer · Public domain, Wikimedia Commons
Quick-fire facts
- •He was born and died in Nuremberg, the son of a Hungarian-born goldsmith
- •He trained with Michael Wolgemut and visited Italy, including Venice, twice
- •The three Meisterstiche are Knight, Death and the Devil (1513), St Jerome in His Study (1514) and Melencolia I (1514)
- •His woodcut series The Apocalypse (1498) includes The Four Horsemen
- •He painted three self-portraits; the 1493 one is in the Louvre, the 1498 one in the Prado
- •His late diptych The Four Apostles (1526), in the Alte Pinakothek, reflects his Protestant sympathies
- •He published theoretical treatises on geometry, fortification and human proportion
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Sources
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — Albrecht Dürer
- E. H. Gombrich — The Story of Art