Melencolia details

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The idle question “Where can you find the best reproduction of Albrecht Dürer’s Melencolia I?” was answered at the Google Art Project where there are four different prints to examine. As usual it seems churlish to complain but I would have preferred one decent copy and a few more Dürer engravings in place of the duplicates; his Knight, Death and the Devil, for example, is absent. There are several other engravings, however, all of whose minute details and shading benefit from close scrutiny. Dürer is well-represented compared to other artists, there are several paintings there as well. The only oddity is the inclusion of this drawing of three witches by Dürer’s pupil Hans Baldung Grien. The museum that owns the drawing credits Grien but a search isn’t really necessary when it’s signed with the artist’s “HBG” monogram in place of Dürer’s famous “AD”. Does Google have any art historians proofing these entries or is it solely the work of technicians copying and pasting information?

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Previously on { feuilleton }
Albrecht Dürer’s Triumphal Arch

5 thoughts on “Melencolia details”

  1. Thank you for the details from “Melancholia”, I confess my heart quickened a bit upon seeing the snake-tailed-rodent demon. He has been a favorite of mine for quite some time and you happily provided a close up view. I will head over to the google site but I must say I prefer to get my info from your informative postings.
    Take care,
    Leonard

  2. There’s a nicer image (200 MB tiff at 1000 dpi) of Melancolia over at the US Library of Congress site: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2009632538/

    They also have an image of Knight, Death, and the Devil but its quite old and there are better ones at the National Gallery of Art: https://images.nga.gov/en/search/do_quick_search.html?q=durer+knight+death+devil

    The quality on them isn’t quite as nice, 1200 pixels across, or 3000 pixels across if you register. And they’re jpgs.

    –Paul

  3. Gabriel: I love Dürer’s drawings, prefer them and his print work to his paintings.

    Paul: Thanks, I ought to have tried there since I’ve linked to enough of their other content. One thing I like about the Google pages is the ability to move continually in and out and pan around.

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