Research different artist that used landscape as their main subject?
Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528)
A supremely gifted and versatile German artist of the Renaissance period, Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528) was born in the Franconian city of Nuremberg, one of the strongest artistic and commercial centers in Europe during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. He was a brilliant
,
, and writer, though his first and probably greatest artistic impact was in the medium of
. Dürer apprenticed with his father, who was a goldsmith, and with the local painter Michael Wolgemut, whose workshop produced
for major books and publications. An admirer of his compatriot Martin Schongauer, Dürer revolutionized printmaking, elevating it to the level of an independent art form. He expanded its tonal and dramatic range, and provided the imagery with a new conceptual foundation. By the age of thirty, Dürer had completed or begun three of his most famous series of woodcuts on religious subjects: The Apocalypse (1498;
,
), the Large Woodcut Passion cycle (ca. 1497–1500), and the Life of the Virgin (begun 1500). He went on to produce independent prints, such as the
Adam and Eve (1504;
), and small, self-contained groups of images, such as the so-called Master Engravings featuring Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513;
), Saint Jerome in His Study (1514), and Melancholia I(1514;
), which were intended more for connoisseurs and collectors than for popular devotion. Their technical virtuosity, intellectual scope, and psychological depth were unmatched by earlier printed work.
More than any other Northern European artist, Dürer was engaged by the artistic practices and theoretical interests of Italy. He visited the country twice, from 1494 to 1495 and again from 1505 to 1507, absorbing firsthand some of the great works of the Italian Renaissance, as well as the
and theoretical writings of the region. The influence of
and design can be seen in the Feast of the Rose Garlands altarpiece (1506;
), commissioned from Dürer by a German colony of merchants living in Venice. Dürer developed a new interest in the human form, as demonstrated by his
and antique studies. Italian theoretical pursuits also resonated deeply with the artist. He wrote Four Books of Human Proportion (Vier Bücher von menschlichen Proportion), only the first of which was published during his lifetime (1528), as well as an introductory manual of geometric theory for students (Underweysung der Messung, 1525;
), which includes the first scientific treatment of
by a Northern European artist.
Dürer’s talent, ambition, and sharp, wide-ranging intellect earned him the attention and friendship of some of the most prominent figures in German society. He became official court artist to
Maximilian I and his successor Charles V, for whom Dürer designed and helped execute a range of artistic projects. In Nuremberg, a vibrant center of humanism and one of the first to officially embrace the principles of the
, Dürer had access to some of Europe’s outstanding theologians and scholars, including Erasmus (
), Philipp Melanchthon, and Willibald Pirkheimer, each captured by the artist in shrewd
. For Nuremberg’s town hall, the artist painted two panels of the Four Apostles (1526; Munich, Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, Alte Pinakothek), bearing texts in Martin Luther’s translation that pay tribute to the city’s adoption of Lutheranism. Hundreds of surviving drawings, letters, and diary entries document Dürer’s
and the Netherlands (1520–21), attesting to his insistently scientific perspective and demanding artistic judgment.
The artist also cast a bold light on his own image through a number of striking self-portraits—drawn, painted, and printed. They reveal an increasingly successful and self-assured master, eager to assert his creative genius and inherent nobility, while still marked by a clear-eyed, often foreboding outlook. They provide us with the cumulative portrait of an extraordinary Northern European artist whose epitaph proclaimed: “Whatever was mortal in Albrecht Dürer lies beneath this mound.”
Findings
Looking at the Artist George shaw, and some of his recent work in his exhibition, felt very familiar to me, and was surprised to see some of my work slightly resembles some of his.
This landscape is one that stood out to me. Its high contrast value shows a sumptuous feel but at the same time gloomy and murky.
The sadness of the middle ages life model, Made me think of my statue drawing in Exercise 4 Statues.
Hanging around, made me think of the trees I drew for exercise Exercise 3 study of multiple trees.
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