page_title: Albrecht Dürer
section_title: Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
hierarchical_section_title: Albrecht Dürer / Biography / Journey to the Netherlands (1520–1521)
caption_attribution_description: schilderij (http://vocab.getty.edu/aat/300177435), Henri Leys(https://viaf.org/viaf/77126487), koninklijk museum voor schone kunsten antwerpen
context_page_description: Albrecht Dürer, sometimes spelt in English as Durer or Duerer, was a German painter, printmaker, and theorist of the German Renaissance. Born in Nuremberg, Dürer established his reputation and influence across Europe when he was in his twenties due to his high-quality woodcut prints. He was in communication with the major Italian artists of his time, including Raphael, Giovanni Bellini and Leonardo da Vinci, and from 1512 was patronized by Emperor Maximilian I. Dürer is commemorated by both the Lutheran and Episcopal Churches.
  Dürer's vast body of work includes engravings, his preferred technique in his later prints, altarpieces, portraits and self-portraits, watercolours and books. The woodcuts series are more Gothic than the rest of his work. His well-known engravings include the three Meisterstiche Knight, Death and the Devil, Saint Jerome in his Study and Melencolia I. His watercolours mark him as one of the first European landscape artists, while his woodcuts revolutionized the potential of that medium.
context_section_description: Maximilian's death came at a time when Dürer was concerned he was losing "my sight and freedom of hand" (perhaps caused by arthritis) and increasingly affected by the writings of Martin Luther. In July 1520 Dürer made his fourth and last major journey, to renew the Imperial pension Maximilian had given him and to secure the patronage of the new emperor, Charles V, who was to be crowned at Aachen. Dürer journeyed with his wife and her maid via the Rhine to Cologne and then to Antwerp, where he was well received and produced numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. In addition to attending the coronation, he visited Cologne (where he admired the painting of Stefan Lochner), Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Bruges (where he saw Michelangelo's Madonna of Bruges), Ghent (where he admired van Eyck's Ghent altarpiece), and Zeeland.
  Dürer took a large stock of prints with him and wrote in his diary to whom he gave, exchanged or sold them, and for how much. This provides rare information of the monetary value placed on prints at this time. Unlike paintings, their sale was very rarely documented. While providing valuable documentary evidence, Dürer's Netherlandish diary also reveals that the trip was not a profitable one. For example, Dürer offered his last portrait of Maximilian to his daughter, Margaret of Austria, but eventually traded the picture for some white cloth after Margaret disliked the portrait and declined to accept it. During this trip he also met Bernard van Orley, Jan Provoost, Gerard Horenbout, Jean Mone, Joachim Patinir and Tommaso Vincidor, though he did not, it seems, meet Quentin Matsys.
  At the request of Christian II of Denmark, Dürer went to Brussels to paint the King's portrait. There he saw "the things which have been sent to the king from the golden land"—the Aztec treasure that Hernán Cortés had sent home to Charles V following the fall of Mexico. Dürer wrote that this treasure "was much more beautiful to me than miracles. These things are so precious that they have been valued at 100,000 florins". Dürer also appears to have been collecting for his own cabinet of curiosities, and he sent back to Nuremberg various animal horns, a piece of coral, some large fish fins, and a wooden weapon from the East Indies.
  Having secured his pension, Dürer finally returned home in July 1521, having caught an undetermined illness—perhaps malaria—which afflicted him for the rest of his life, and greatly reduced his rate of work.
caption: Visit of Albrecht Dürer in Antwerp in 1520, Jan August Hendrik Leys, 1855, Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp, 2198
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "6528", "Image ImageLength": "3575", "Image BitsPerSample": "8", "Image Make": "Hasselblad", "Image Model": "Hasselblad CF528-39 - Hasselblad H Series", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS6 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2018:05:24 10:15:01", "Image Artist": "Hugo Maertens", "Image YCbCrSubSampling": "[2, 2]", "Image ExifOffset": "304", "EXIF ExposureTime": "6", "EXIF FNumber": "11", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Manual", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "50", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0210", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2008:11:03 13:23:09", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:11:03 13:23:09", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "-40328/15601", "EXIF ApertureValue": "16799/2428", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Average", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "120", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "6528", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3575"}