Carro trionfale di Massimiliano I

Reference: s42513
Author Albrecht DURER
Year: 1522 ca.
Measures: 2280 x 450 mm
Not Available

Reference: s42513
Author Albrecht DURER
Year: 1522 ca.
Measures: 2280 x 450 mm
Not Available

Description

Woodcut, without monogram, dated 1522 but probably completed in 1518.

L. Strauss in TIB 1001.339, pp. 421-422: “An exchange of letters between Willibald Pirckheimer and Emperor Maximilian I during 1518 documents the latter's desire and detailed plan to publish a large, alle- gorical "Triumphal Procession' could grace the walls of council chambers and great halls of the empire, proclaiming for posterity the noble aims of their erst- while ruler. Of this large paper procession, the emperor's chariot was only a part, entrusted to Dürer, whereas other chariots, movable floats, and standard bearers were assigned to several other art- ists, including Hans Burgkmair of Augsburg. The emperor died before it was completed. We must assume that Dürer's portion was nearly complete in 1518, although the blocks bear the date 1522, when they were published, apparently which without authorization, but undoubtedly in order to recover some of the outlay in time and expense. When the entire triumphal procession was finally issued, Dürer's portion was omitted, presumably because Archduke Ferdinand, Maximilian's grandson, who paid for its publication, was chagrined about Dürer's unilateral action. The explanatory text for this chariot was written by Pirckheimer:

 

The Chariot of Honor or Triumph, here pictured, was invented upon the command of the most illustrious and mighty Lord, the Emperor Maximilian, now deceased. It was executed by Albrecht Dürer to humbly please the now reigning, mighty Emperor Charles. Firstly, because His Imperial Majesty ex- ceeds all kings and princes in glory, honor, magnificence, and dignity, the chariot in which His Majesty rides is supported by four wheels of honor. On account of his excellence these are named "Gloria," "Magnificentia," "Dignitas," and "Honor." Following, the four angelic virtues, Justicia, Fortitudo, Prudentia, and Temperentia are placed on four pedestals upon the chariot. From these all other virtues spring without which neither king nor lord can be, nor wish to be. No empire will last which suffers from a lack of character, reason, and modesty. These four virtues are interrelated and can- not be separated. If one virtue is lacking, the others are imperfect. Likewise the ancillary virtues which spring from these four are inter- related and fused one to the other. Because Justice requires truth, she holds the wreath of truth in her left hand, It is touched by her right hand signifying temperance. Where there is no truth there cannot be justice. Also temperance divorced from truth cannot be termed temper-ance. The right hand of Justice touches the wreath of clemency. This is to show that justice must not be too severe but should be tempered with clemency. The wreath of equitability is linked to the former, for justice should be neither too mild too severe, but equal and constant. Without such Justice of equality it cannot be sustained.

 

The entire image is printed from eight separate blocks. A trial impression of the emperor being crowned by Victory, hand printed by friction, is in the British Museum.”

Our copy is from the fifth edition of the work, with Latin text and the date 1589; it was published by the German publisher Jacobus Chinig in Venice. Under the original date we read the imprint: Anno autem Domini M.D.LXXXIX. Iacobus Kinig Germanus, tabulas hasce ad haeredibus Alberti Durerii aere proprio emptas, iterum Venetis divulgandas curavit.

Our exemplar bears both the watermark "shield with initials S and G", (Meder 338) and the "crescent moon in the circle" (Meder 50) found by the repertories as typical of the two first editions of the Venetian edition of Chinig, which Briquet identifies as Venetian paper of the second half of the 16th century. This is a homogeneous example both in printing and in the paper, which appears identical except for the watermark.

The fact that, in that period, Dürer's wooden plates were in Italy is not surprising in the least: it is well known, in fact, that Venice was home to a large German community of artists known as the Fondaco dei Tedeschi, with whom Dürer himself had collaborated in the past. Moreover, the Doge, towards the middle of the 16th century, established a sort of privilege that protected printing rights, allowing a rapid development of chalcographic workshops and making the city, together with Rome, the international center of graphic works.  It is highly probable that, in addition to the wooden plates, a certain quantity of paper sheets had arrived from Germany, and that the publisher had used mixed sheets for printing the plates.

Examples of this fifth edition are known to be in libraries or collections in Basel, Berlin, British Museum, Weimar, Vienna, Zurich, and the Library of Congress (missing part of the text). 

Comparing the rare examples present in public collections and museums, we can see that most of them were in the past preserved in albums, like our example. For example, the two examples in the British Museum are preserved in albums, while the examèle in the Metropolitan Museum and in the New York Public Library have undergone a conservative restoration that shows that they came from collection albums; furthermore, the example in the National Gallery of Art (Rosenwald Collection) is joined and preserved in albums. The impression quality of this example is remarkable, compared to those personally consulted in major museums.

Beautiful proof, printed on contemporary laid paper, minimal defects in the folds, otherwise in excellent condition. 

Magnificent example of this great silographic work.

Bibliografia

Bartsch, 139; Dogson (1903), p. 339, n. 145d: Heinecke, p. 202, n. 8; Heller, n. 1912; Hind, 252; Meder 252; Passavant, v. 3, p. 170 n. 139; Strauss (1980), pp. 536-539, n. 188: TIB (Strauss), 1001.339, pp. 421-422.

 

Albrecht DURER (Norimberga 1471 - 1528)

Dürer was a German painter, wood carver, engraver, and mathematician. He is best known for his woodcuts in series, including the Apocalypse (1498), two series on the crucifixion of Christ, the Great Passion (1498-1510) and the Little Passion (1510-11) as well as many of his individual prints, such as Knight, Death, and the Devil(1513) and Melancholia I (1514). Dürer was born in the Imperial Free City of Nuremberg. His family came from the Kingdom of Hungary, germanizing the family name of Thürer when they settled in Nuremberg soon after the middle of the 15th century. His father, also called Albrecht, was a goldsmith and served as assistant to Hieronymus Helfer, marrying his daughter Barbara in 1468. They had eighteen children, Albrecht was the second. Albrecht's brother, Hans Dürer, also became a renowned artist. As a youngster, Albrecht the younger apprenticed under his father, where he learned the fine art of goldsmithing, and to handle a burin. Then at the age of fifteen Dürer was apprenticed to the principal painter of the town, Michael Wolgemut, a prolific if undistinguished producer of small works in the late Gothic style. Dürer learned not only painting but also wood carving and elementary copper engraving under Wolgemut. At the end of his apprenticeship in 1490 he travelled (the so-called Wanderjahre). In 1492 he arrived in Colmar, intending to study under Martin Schöngauer, a well regarded painter-engraver of his time. He found that Schongauer had died the previous year, but he was received kindly by the family of the deceased master there and in Basel. Under them he evidently had some practice both in metal-engraving and in furnishing designs for the woodcutter. He left Basel some time in 1494 and travelled briefly in the Low Countries before he returned to Nuremberg. From this period, little of the work that can be attributed to him with certainty survives, though several of the illustrations of the Nuremberg Chronicle are sometimes attributed to him. On July 9, 1494 Dürer was married, according to an arrangement made during his absence, to Agnes Frey, the daughter of a local merchant. His relationship with his wife is unclear and her reputation has suffered from a posthumous assault by Dürer's friends. He did not remain in Nuremberg long; in the autumn of 1494 he travelled to Italy, leaving his wife at Nuremberg. He went to Venice, evidence of his travels being derived from drawings and engravings that are closely linked to existing northern Italian works by Mantegna, Antonio Pollaiuolo, Lorenzo di Credi and others. Some time in 1495 Dürer must have returned to Nuremberg, where he seems to have lived and worked for possibly the next ten years, producing most of his notable prints. During the first few years from 1495 onwards he worked in the established Germanic and northern forms but was open to the influences of the Renaissance. His best works in this period were for wood-block printing, typical scenes of popular devotion developed into his famous series of sixteen great designs for the Apocalypse, first carved in 1498. Counterpointed with the first seven of scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later a series of eleven on the Holy Family and of saints. Around 1504-1505 he carved the first seventeen prints of a set illustrating the life of the Virgin. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published till several years later. Dürer trained himself in the more finely detailed and expensive copper-engraving. He attempted no subjects of the scale of his woodcuts, but produced a number of Madonnas, single figures from scripture or of the saints, some nude mythologies, and groups, sometimes satirical, of ordinary people. The Venetian artist Jacopo de Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, came to Nuremberg for a while in 1500. He influenced Dürer with the new developments in perspective, anatomy and proportion, from which Dürer began his own studies. A series of extant drawings shows Dürer's experiments in human proportion, up to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504) which showed his firm and detailed grasp of landscape had extended into the quality of flesh surfaces by the subtlest use of the graving-tool known to him. Two or three other technical masterpieces were produced up to 1505, when he made a second visit to Italy. In Italy he turned his hand to painting, at first producing a series of works by tempera-painting on linen, including portraits and altarpieces, notably the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506 he returned to Venice, and stayed there until the spring of 1507. The occasion of this journey has been erroneously stated by Vasari. Dürer's engravings had by this time attained great popularity and had begun to be copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of St. Bartholomew. The picture painted by Dürer was closer to the Italian style - the Adoration of the Virgin, also known as the Feast of Rose Garlands; it was subsequently acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague. Other paintings Dürer produced in Venice include The Virgin and Child with the Goldfinch, a Christ disputing with the Doctors (apparently produced in a mere five days) and a number of smaller works. Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer was back in Nuremberg by mid-1507. He remained in Germany until 1520. His reputation spread all over Europe. He was on terms of friendship or friendly communication with all the masters of the age, and Raphael held himself honored in exchanging drawings with Dürer. The years between his return from Venice and his journey to the Netherlands are commonly divided according to the type of work with which he was principally occupied. The first five years, 1507-1511, are pre-eminently the painting years of his life. In them, working with a vast number of preliminary drawings and studies, he produced what have been accounted his four best works in painting - Adam and Eve (1507), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece the Assumption of the Virgin (1509), and the Adoration of the Trinity by all the Saints (1511). During this period he also completed the two woodcut series of the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. From 1511 to 1514, Dürer concentrated on engraving, both on wood and copper, but especially the latter. The major work he produced in this period was the thirty-seven subjects of the Little Passion on wood, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small copper-engravings on the same theme in 1512. In 1513 and 1514 appeared the three most famous of Dürer's works in copper-engraving, The Knight and Death (or simply The Knight, as he called it, 1513), Melancolia and St Jerome in his Study (both 1514). In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works. Tempera on linen portraits in 1516. Engravings on many subjects, experiments in etching on plates of iron and zinc. A part of the Triumphal Gate and the Triumphal March for the Emperor Maximilian. He also did the marginal decorations for the Emperor's prayer-book and a portrait-drawing of the Emperor shortly before his death in 1519. In the summer of 1520 the desire of Dürer to secure new patronage following the death of Maximilian and an outbreak of sickness in Nuremberg, gave occasion to his fourth and last journey. Together with his wife and her maid he set out in July for the Netherlands in order to be present at the coronation of the new Emperor Charles V. He journeyed by the Rhine, Cologne, and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk or charcoal. Besides going to Aachen for the coronation, he made excursions to Cologne, Nijmwegen, Hertogenbosch, Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Zeeland. He finally returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness which afflicted him for the rest of his life.

Albrecht DURER (Norimberga 1471 - 1528)

Dürer was a German painter, wood carver, engraver, and mathematician. He is best known for his woodcuts in series, including the Apocalypse (1498), two series on the crucifixion of Christ, the Great Passion (1498-1510) and the Little Passion (1510-11) as well as many of his individual prints, such as Knight, Death, and the Devil(1513) and Melancholia I (1514). Dürer was born in the Imperial Free City of Nuremberg. His family came from the Kingdom of Hungary, germanizing the family name of Thürer when they settled in Nuremberg soon after the middle of the 15th century. His father, also called Albrecht, was a goldsmith and served as assistant to Hieronymus Helfer, marrying his daughter Barbara in 1468. They had eighteen children, Albrecht was the second. Albrecht's brother, Hans Dürer, also became a renowned artist. As a youngster, Albrecht the younger apprenticed under his father, where he learned the fine art of goldsmithing, and to handle a burin. Then at the age of fifteen Dürer was apprenticed to the principal painter of the town, Michael Wolgemut, a prolific if undistinguished producer of small works in the late Gothic style. Dürer learned not only painting but also wood carving and elementary copper engraving under Wolgemut. At the end of his apprenticeship in 1490 he travelled (the so-called Wanderjahre). In 1492 he arrived in Colmar, intending to study under Martin Schöngauer, a well regarded painter-engraver of his time. He found that Schongauer had died the previous year, but he was received kindly by the family of the deceased master there and in Basel. Under them he evidently had some practice both in metal-engraving and in furnishing designs for the woodcutter. He left Basel some time in 1494 and travelled briefly in the Low Countries before he returned to Nuremberg. From this period, little of the work that can be attributed to him with certainty survives, though several of the illustrations of the Nuremberg Chronicle are sometimes attributed to him. On July 9, 1494 Dürer was married, according to an arrangement made during his absence, to Agnes Frey, the daughter of a local merchant. His relationship with his wife is unclear and her reputation has suffered from a posthumous assault by Dürer's friends. He did not remain in Nuremberg long; in the autumn of 1494 he travelled to Italy, leaving his wife at Nuremberg. He went to Venice, evidence of his travels being derived from drawings and engravings that are closely linked to existing northern Italian works by Mantegna, Antonio Pollaiuolo, Lorenzo di Credi and others. Some time in 1495 Dürer must have returned to Nuremberg, where he seems to have lived and worked for possibly the next ten years, producing most of his notable prints. During the first few years from 1495 onwards he worked in the established Germanic and northern forms but was open to the influences of the Renaissance. His best works in this period were for wood-block printing, typical scenes of popular devotion developed into his famous series of sixteen great designs for the Apocalypse, first carved in 1498. Counterpointed with the first seven of scenes of the Great Passion in the same year, and a little later a series of eleven on the Holy Family and of saints. Around 1504-1505 he carved the first seventeen prints of a set illustrating the life of the Virgin. Neither these nor the Great Passion were published till several years later. Dürer trained himself in the more finely detailed and expensive copper-engraving. He attempted no subjects of the scale of his woodcuts, but produced a number of Madonnas, single figures from scripture or of the saints, some nude mythologies, and groups, sometimes satirical, of ordinary people. The Venetian artist Jacopo de Barbari, whom Dürer had met in Venice, came to Nuremberg for a while in 1500. He influenced Dürer with the new developments in perspective, anatomy and proportion, from which Dürer began his own studies. A series of extant drawings shows Dürer's experiments in human proportion, up to the famous engraving of Adam and Eve (1504) which showed his firm and detailed grasp of landscape had extended into the quality of flesh surfaces by the subtlest use of the graving-tool known to him. Two or three other technical masterpieces were produced up to 1505, when he made a second visit to Italy. In Italy he turned his hand to painting, at first producing a series of works by tempera-painting on linen, including portraits and altarpieces, notably the Paumgartner altarpiece and the Adoration of the Magi. In early 1506 he returned to Venice, and stayed there until the spring of 1507. The occasion of this journey has been erroneously stated by Vasari. Dürer's engravings had by this time attained great popularity and had begun to be copied. In Venice he was given a valuable commission from the emigrant German community for the church of St. Bartholomew. The picture painted by Dürer was closer to the Italian style - the Adoration of the Virgin, also known as the Feast of Rose Garlands; it was subsequently acquired by the Emperor Rudolf II and taken to Prague. Other paintings Dürer produced in Venice include The Virgin and Child with the Goldfinch, a Christ disputing with the Doctors (apparently produced in a mere five days) and a number of smaller works. Despite the regard in which he was held by the Venetians, Dürer was back in Nuremberg by mid-1507. He remained in Germany until 1520. His reputation spread all over Europe. He was on terms of friendship or friendly communication with all the masters of the age, and Raphael held himself honored in exchanging drawings with Dürer. The years between his return from Venice and his journey to the Netherlands are commonly divided according to the type of work with which he was principally occupied. The first five years, 1507-1511, are pre-eminently the painting years of his life. In them, working with a vast number of preliminary drawings and studies, he produced what have been accounted his four best works in painting - Adam and Eve (1507), Virgin with the Iris (1508), the altarpiece the Assumption of the Virgin (1509), and the Adoration of the Trinity by all the Saints (1511). During this period he also completed the two woodcut series of the Great Passion and the Life of the Virgin, both published in 1511 together with a second edition of the Apocalypse series. From 1511 to 1514, Dürer concentrated on engraving, both on wood and copper, but especially the latter. The major work he produced in this period was the thirty-seven subjects of the Little Passion on wood, published first in 1511, and a set of fifteen small copper-engravings on the same theme in 1512. In 1513 and 1514 appeared the three most famous of Dürer's works in copper-engraving, The Knight and Death (or simply The Knight, as he called it, 1513), Melancolia and St Jerome in his Study (both 1514). In the years leading to 1520 he produced a wide range of works. Tempera on linen portraits in 1516. Engravings on many subjects, experiments in etching on plates of iron and zinc. A part of the Triumphal Gate and the Triumphal March for the Emperor Maximilian. He also did the marginal decorations for the Emperor's prayer-book and a portrait-drawing of the Emperor shortly before his death in 1519. In the summer of 1520 the desire of Dürer to secure new patronage following the death of Maximilian and an outbreak of sickness in Nuremberg, gave occasion to his fourth and last journey. Together with his wife and her maid he set out in July for the Netherlands in order to be present at the coronation of the new Emperor Charles V. He journeyed by the Rhine, Cologne, and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk or charcoal. Besides going to Aachen for the coronation, he made excursions to Cologne, Nijmwegen, Hertogenbosch, Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Zeeland. He finally returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness which afflicted him for the rest of his life.