Masters of German Art : Albrecht Dürer

Albrecht Dürer embodied a new type of artist, one who represented a different attitude to art and enjoyed high social status of the kind already accorded to Italian artists of his time. With his revolutionary innovations in paining as well as printed artwork Dürer introduced the Renaissance to German art. Humanistic philosophy of his day proved as fruitful a source to him as his study of the art of antiquity or the works of his European artistic contemporaries, which he drew on for wholly novel purposes. The enduring enthusiasm for Albrecht Dürer highlights the nature of his genius and his unique role in giving German art the impetus to historic progress.