Albrecht Dürer

Nuremberg

His father was a goldsmith who had emigrated from Hungary.

💡 Did you know? Dürer's father was a goldsmith from Hungary: the precision of that craft shaped the son.

Renaissance (north of the Alps)

He was the bridge between Italian and German art.

💡 Did you know? Dürer travelled to Italy twice and brought Renaissance ideas of proportion and perspective back to Germany.

printmaking

With engraving and woodcut Dürer was the first to reach a mass audience; his prints were sold across Europe.

💡 Did you know? His printable sheets made him famous across Europe.

the AD monogram

Dürer signed almost all his works with the interlocked „AD.“

💡 Did you know? The monogram grew so valuable that it was forged even in Dürer's lifetime: he brought a lawsuit against it in Venice.

self-confident self-portraits

Dürer painted himself several times, as a self-assured artist, not a mere craftsman.

💡 Did you know? In the "Self-Portrait with Fur-Trimmed Robe" he adopts a pose otherwise reserved for Christ.

Nuremberg

He also left writings on proportion and perspective.

💡 Did you know? Dürer also left theoretical books on proportion and fortification; he was artist and scholar at once.

The Rhinoceros

A 1515 woodcut: it shaped the European image of the rhinoceros for almost 300 years.

💡 Did you know? Dürer had never seen a rhinoceros and drew it from a description: the woodcut shaped Europe's image of the animal for 300 years.

Self-Portrait with Fur-Trimmed Robe

A 1500 self-portrait in a frontal, almost Christ-like pose.

💡 Did you know? Dürer depicted himself frontally and symmetrically as usually only Christ was shown: a bold self-confidence for 1500.

Melencolia I

A famous 1514 engraving, full of enigmatic symbols.

💡 Did you know? The enigmatic engraving contains a „magic square“ whose bottom row spells out the year 1514.

The Four Apostles

Painted around 1526.

💡 Did you know? Dürer gave the two-panel painting to his home city of Nuremberg as a kind of legacy.

Adam and Eve

Painted around 1507.

💡 Did you know? Dürer combined Italian ideal proportion with northern attention to detail: each animal carries symbolic meaning.

Ship of Fools

Painted around 1494.

💡 Did you know? The young Dürer created the woodcuts for Sebastian Brant's bestseller „The Ship of Fools.“

Adoration of the Magi

Painted around 1504.

💡 Did you know? In this painting Dürer shows off his newly learned command of perspective and Italian colour.

Knight, Death, and the Devil

A masterly engraving of 1513.

💡 Did you know? The knight rides on unswayed past Death and the Devil: one of Dürer's three celebrated „master engravings.“

Feast of the Rosary

Painted around 1506.

💡 Did you know? Dürer painted the altarpiece in Venice to prove to the Italians that a German too could paint in colour.

St. Jerome in His Study

Painted around 1514.

💡 Did you know? The second „master engraving“ shows cosy scholarly calm: the counterpart to the restless „Melencolia.“

Self-Portrait

Painted around 1498.

💡 Did you know? Before an open window landscape Dürer presents himself as a worldly, fashionably dressed gentleman.

Albrecht Dürer

Albrecht Dürer (1471 to 1528) was the greatest artist of the German Renaissance, famous as a painter and a supreme master of printmaking.

💡 Did you know? Dürer was the first German artist of European fame: his prints made him known and wealthy across Europe already in his lifetime.