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Albrecht Dürer, printmaker

The Four Witches, 1497

Description

Maker

  • Albrecht Dürer, 1471-1528, German, printmaker

Title

The Four Witches

Year

1497

Medium

Engraving, trimmed within platemark

Materials/Techniques

Materials

  • engraving

Supports

  • Light weight laid paper

Dimensions

Plate: 19.1 x 13.2 cm (7 1/2 x 5 3/16 inches)

Signature / Inscription / Marks

Lettered within image UC: "1497 O. G. H."; and LC: "AD"

Verso: collector's mark of Vinzent Mayer, New York and Freiburg (1831-1918); Lugt 2525)

Identification

State

Only state

Type

  • Works on Paper,
  • Prints

Credit

Gift of Mr. Henry D. Sharpe

Object Number

49.127

Projects & Publications

Publications

The Brilliant Line

Following the Early Modern Engraver, 1480-1650
Read Online

Dürer-Katalog

Ein Handbuch über Albrecht Dürers Stiche, Radierungen, Holzschnitte

Exhibition History

Exhibition History

The Brilliant Line

September 18, 2009 - January 3, 2010

Early in his career, Albrecht Dürer grappled with the rigidity of engraving and depicted nude bodies with some hesitation. For instance, the poor reconciliation of shading within the left-hand figure’s shape indicates that he may have begun the figure with a complete, single outline and thereafter shaded the form with hatching. As he quickly became proficient in the medium, Dürer worked in sections, modeling each section entirely before drawing a complete outline.

Dürer’s depiction of four nude females and a grotesque devil exploits the late-15th-century interest in the Greek goddess Hecate, patroness of evil magic and transformations and goddess of crossroads. Hecate was often represented with three faces or bodies, probably to suggest that she could look in all directions at doorways or crossings. An underworld goddess, her counterpart on earth was Diana. Some scholars have therefore interpreted Dürer’s four female figures as Diana, her backside facing the viewer, surrounded by the three forms of Hecate, her alter ego. Such complex allusions corresponded with the revival of classical languages and literature by humanists such as Willibald Pirkheimer in Dürer’s native Nuremberg.

German Renaissance Graphics from the Museum's Collection

November 28, 1961 - January 7, 1962

Use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in the public domain (CC0 1.0). This object is The Four Witches with the accession number of 49.127. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

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