Descripción

Title: Dürer ? Cranach ? Holbein : Die Entdeckung des Menschen : Das deutsche Porträt um 1500 Author: Brinkmann, Bodo (et al) Price: Euro 125.00 ISBN: 9783777437019 Record created on 01/07/2011 Description: München: Hirmer, 2011. 28cm., hardcover, 351pp. with numerous color plates. Exhibition held at Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna. Summary : The exhibition explores the artist's view of man during the transition of the Late Middle Ages to the Early Modern Era in the German-speaking world. To date, early German portraiture has never been the exclusive subject of a large survey as the shadows of both Netherlandish and Italian counterparts have obscured the view of German contributions in this genre. Indeed, the Netherlandish artists may be credited for their naturalism that enabled the distinctive character of man's depiction, whereas the tension between idealisation and likeness in Italian portraits defined the concept of beauty of an entire epoch, namely the Renaissance. Yet, German portraiture too, led by its greatest exponents Dürer, Cranach the Elder and Holbein the Younger, attained highly significant and fully fledged artistic achievements. Its particular strength lies in the authentic depiction of an individual, paired with the subtle psychological penetration of the sitter. This show presents outstanding works by the greatest artists of their time, demonstrating the contemporary artistic notion of the various genera dicendi of art, in other words, the three basic rhetoric principles: the sublime and distinguished, as personified by Dürer; the simple and unadorned, espoused by Cranach; and finally Holbein's hitherto unattained interpretation of rendering reality, space and body in such a lifelike manner that they appear tangible - in short, three mutually enriching concepts that to this day have influenced our view of early German art.