Dürer was a German artist who went
to Italy to study the work of the Renaissance artists there. He studied perspective and the theory of
proportions. He became most famous for
his engraved images in metal plates via intaglio printmaking, which is a
process in which ink is forced to fill lines cut into metal surface. His famous work of the Knight, Death, and the
Devil is an engraving made in 1513.
The figures in this picture are
reminiscent of the strange creatures in Northern Gothic paintings, as Dürer
liked to combine his own ideas with Renaissance ideas. It shows a stalwart Christian soldier making
his way to the heavenly Jerusalem (which we can see on the hilltop),
accompanied by a loyal dog. Death is the
scary old man holding up the hourglass (indicating that his time is running
out), and the Devil is a weird, almost silly-looking animal-like thing (Dürer
here makes fun of Satan).
Dürer also made woodcuts—prints
made from a design raised in relief on a wooden block. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse is a
woodcut which he engraved.
This image was inspired by
Revelation 6:1-8, where the Apostle John describes four horsemen to come during
the End Times. (From closest to farthest
in the engraving I list them). The rider
on a sickly, pale horse is death; the rider holding a set of scales (weights)
on a black horse is plague and famine; the rider carrying a sword on a red
horse is war; the rider on a white horse is conquest (though Dürer makes a
mistake in that in the biblical account the rider has a bow but no arrow).
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