Albrecht Dürer, Head of a Woman, a drawing 1520/1520

‘Human curiosity can be so sated by an excess of all worldly things that it becomes weary of them, with the sole exception of knowing a great deal, of which no one tires.’
Albrecht Durer

I recently attended an exhibition of the work of the German artist Albrecht Durer. (‘Durer’s Journeys’ is at the National Gallery, London until 27 February.)

At the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries Durer painted deeply felt religious paintings and stunning portraits and self-portraits. He also created a vast number of drawings, engravings and woodcuts - most famously his exploration of mythical subjects set in precisely observed depictions of the natural world.

The winged angel Melencolia sits with her head in one hand awaiting inspiration. Saint Jerome works away in his study, a dog and lion slumbering side-by-side on the floor in front of him. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse trample all before them. A Knight rides alongside Death and the Devil, resigned to his fate.

'An artist of understanding and experience can show more of his great power and art in small things roughly and rudely done, than many another in a great work.’

One can’t help but be struck by Durer’s acute eye for detail: the bark of a tree, the foliage on a branch and the rocks in a ravine; the tension in a muscle, the curls in long hair and the folds in a fabric are all rendered with meticulous care and attention.

'Sight is the noblest sense of man.'

Clearly Durer’s prodigious natural talent was fuelled by a curious mind, a passion for understanding, an appetite for travel.

'Art is embedded in nature and they who can extract it, have it.’

Albrecht Dürer, 'The Knight, Death and the Devil', © The Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge

Durer was born in 1471, the son of a Hungarian goldsmith who had settled in Nuremberg. He learned his father’s trade and was apprenticed to one of the town’s leading painters. From 1490 to 1494, as was the custom at that time, he embarked on a Wanderjahre - in effect, gap years – in order to acquire skills from artists in other regions. His trip took him along the Rhine to Strasbourg, Colmar and Basel.

'Love and delight are better teachers than compulsion.’

On his return to Nuremberg, aged 23, Durer got married. But he must have been bitten by the travel bug. That same year he set off on the first of two major trips over the Alps to Italy (1494-5, 1505-7). In Venice he met the elderly Giovanni Bellini and learned to be more confident in his use of colour. From Jacopo de' Barbari he discovered the new developments in perspective, anatomy and proportion.

In 1520-1 the intrepid Durer journeyed to the Low Countries, visiting Antwerp and Aachen, Mechelen and Bruges. In Ghent he admired van Eyck's altarpiece. In Brussels he marvelled at Aztec gold and the animals in the zoo. He met up with royalty, artists and intellectuals. He collected prints and Lutheran pamphlets. He sailed for six days to see a beached whale in Zeeland and was almost killed in a storm.

A 1521 drawing by Dürer of Livonian women in winter dress

‘I was amazed at the subtle ingeniousness of people in foreign lands.’

In the course of his travels Durer kept journals containing numerous drawings in silverpoint, chalk and charcoal. He sketched nobles and nuns, soldiers and servants, dogs and wildlife. He made a note of local landscapes, contemporary fashions and architectural details.

There is a lesson for us all here. At whatever stage we are in life or career, we must find food for thought, catalysts for ideas. We need to look, discover, observe and understand in order to stay fresh. We must continue to learn.

'As I grew older, I realized that it was much better to insist on the genuine forms of nature, for simplicity is the greatest adornment of art.’

Durer died back home in Nuremberg in 1528. He was just 56 years old, but he had led a full and active life. Perhaps he appreciated that the better he understood the world around him, the better he understood himself.

'Some think that they know everybody, but they really don't know themselves.'

'Travel round,
I travel round.
Decadence and pleasure towns,
Tragedies, luxuries, statues, parks and galleries.
Travel round,
I travel round.
Decadence and pleasure towns.’

Simple Minds, ‘I Travel’ (D Forbes / C Burchill / M Macneil / B Mcgee / J Kerr)

No. 354