Books and Prints by Albrecht Durer

Title

Books and Prints by Albrecht Durer

Description

This exhibition features seventy prints by Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528) that highlight the artist’s contributions to European culture and religious experience.

Creator

Bridwell Library Special Collections

Publisher

SMU Libraries

Date

Originally exhibited August 22–December 10, 2011

Collection Items

BRA1087
Woodcut of St. Jerome in his cell surrounded by books, writing implements, a devotional Crucifix, and a faithful lion who guards his studious retreat. Dürer also included symbolism in the broad cardinal's hat and fur-lined robes, books, hourglass,…

BRA1068
The most important German artist before Albrecht Dürer was Martin Schongauer. Schongauer’s prints were the first to combine the elegant naturalism developed by the early Netherlandish painters with the graphic clarity offered by the new medium of…

BRMS 111
Illuminated manuscript with psalms to be recited over the course of a week. There are large gilt initials and an illuminated portrait of King David. This Psalter highlights the quality of manuscript illumination which is conservative. Evidently…

07081
Single leaf from a German blockbook showing an illustration from the Book of Revelation. Woodblock print with hand coloring. Blockbook's lively apocalyptic imagery, derived from earlier manuscripts, provided Dürer’s generation of artists with useful…

06171
Dürer’s godfather, Anton Koberger (c. 1445–1513) created the most important illustrated book produced in Nuremberg during Dürer’s youth, this two-volume German Bible. The woodcuts used in this book originally were produced in Cologne for Heinrich…

06196
Noted for its striking woodcut illustrations, this book recounts a pilgrimage to the Holy Land undertaken in 1483–1484 by Bernhard von Breydenbach, Dean of Mainz Cathedral. Accompanying the pilgrims was Erhard Reuwich, a Dutch artist who provided…

06628
Another work published by Koberger. This devotional written by Stephan Fridolin narrates 100 events in the life of Christ with 91 woodcut illustrations by Michael Wolgemut, who taught Dürer starting in 1486.

06632
The most extensively illustrated book of the fifteenth century was the “Nuremberg Chronicle,” issued in Latin and German editions. Also published by Dürer’s godfather, this history of the world from its creation to the year 1493 included 1,809…

07042/A
This book has the earliest woodcut associated with Albrecht Dürer, which would have been done when he was an 18 year old apprentice in Michael Wolgemut's workshop.

07030
Dürer’s first verified book illustration, a woodcut of St. Jerome removing a thorn from a lion’s paw, was published in Basel by Nicolaus Kesler in 1492. Dürer’s composition exerted considerable influence on frontispiece illustration in the region.…

06017
The immediate impact of Dürer’s St. Jerome frontispiece of 1492 is evident in this woodcut of St. Ambrose, printed in Basel later the same year. Similar to the St. Jerome in conception but less sophisticated in its placement of objects on the floor,…

06963
On his return trip to Nuremberg from Basel, Dürer traveled to Freiburg im Breisgau, where he provided the design for this striking title page woodcut. The image consists of two woodblocks: one for the lady holding the printer’s armorial device, which…

06634
The "Nuremberg Chronicle," a history of the world from the Creation to the year 1493, was the most profusely illustrated book printed during the fifteenth century. Scholars seeking to identify illustrations that might have been contributed by Dürer…

AFM9502
Dürer published the Apocalypse, a book with fifteen full–page illustrations, in German and Latin editions of the biblical text in 1498. With these prints Dürer transformed the “popular” woodcut craft into an art form of immense descriptive and…

BRA1066
The dynamic power of Dürer’s woodcut technique is evident in this print from the Apocalypse series. The woodcut depicts the sounding of the sixth angel’s trumpet, which released a plague of armed horsemen and four avenging angels from the Euphrates…

BRA0252
In this woodcut from the Apocalypse series, Dürer illustrated the beginning of Revelation chapter 14 along with several elements described in earlier chapters of the biblical account.

06881
St Bridget's account of her experiences of "celestial revelations" of Christ's life, the Last Judgment, her own "mystical marriage" to Christ, and divine instructions to found the Brigittine Order. Although the 29 woodcut illustrations for this…

AFM4742
Dürer designed two woodcuts for this first edition of the Latin plays of Hrotsvitha, a tenth–century Benedictine nun from Gandersheim. The two woodcuts by Dürer are the frontispiece, showing Celtes presenting the new edition to Friedrich III of…

06961
Dürer’s closest friend, Wilibald Pirckheimer (1470–1530), was Nuremberg’s leading humanist scholar. As a favor to Pirckheimer, Dürer designed the armorial bookplate that the scholar pasted into his books, including this copy of a popular…

31358
As another favor to his friend Wilibald Pirckheimer, who edited this work by the ancient Greek historian Plutarch, Der designed this handsome title-page border. Surrounding Pirckheimers coat-of-arms in the lower margin, the trumpet-blowing putti, the…

AFU6978
Bridwell Library has one woodcut from Dürer’s “Life of the Virgin,” a book that consisted of twenty illustrations created from 1504 to 1510. This woodcut, the last in the sequence and most likely the last to be produced, depicts the Coronation of the…

11011
Dürer’s Large Passion was issued as a folio–format devotional book. It consisted of a title page depicting the Mocking of Christ and eleven large woodcuts illustrating the narrative of Christ’s Passion as conveyed in Latin verses by Benedictus…

11012
A portable devotional book of 38 leaves issued in small quarto format. It consisted of a title page and 36 woodcuts illustrating the narrative of Christ’s Passion, followed by the colophon, in which the printer identified himself as “Albrecht Dürer,…

AFW8257
Several of the illustrations in this Parisian Book of Hours, such as the exhibited image of Christ Appearing to his Mother, were closely modeled on Dürer’s Small Passion. Here, the anonymous French artist added a scroll bearing Christ’s words “Regina…

AFD3981
The international influence of Dürer’s Small Passion woodcuts can be seen in this Italian book of meditations on the Passion, which reveals obvious dependence on Dürer’s image of Christ before Caiaphas. Here, although an anonymous Venetian artisan…
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