The Rhinoceros
Albrecht Dürer (German, 1471-1528)
1515
- Medium
- Woodcut in black on ivory laid paper
- Classification
- Dimensions
- Image: 21.5 × 30 cm (8 1/2 × 11 13/16 in.); Sheet: 24.8 × 30.5 cm (9 13/16 × 12 1/16 in.)
- Culture
- Germany
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Prints and Drawings
- Credit line
- Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Potter Palmer
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Little Ones profiles and older: it shows gentle subjects for the very young. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
Albrecht Dürer never saw a rhinoceros in real life. Although the letterpress text atop this broadsheet suggests otherwise, he in fact copied the woodcut from a drawing and a description given by an eyewitness before the ship carrying this gift for the king of Portugal sank on the way from India. Nonetheless, despite the lack of direct observation, the resulting image was immensely popular and formed many people’s ideas of the animal’s appearance. As with religious images from this period, the replication of print gave this woodcut its own type of truth.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
