Lecture 1 - Dürer in Nuremberg: Childhood, Boyhood, Youth
This first session considers Dürer’s artistic roots and early career in the city of Nuremberg, one of the pre-eminent trading and craft centres of renaissance Europe, where metal production and book printing were key industries, crucial to Dürer’s formation. Also crucial were family relationships and professional networks: his father was a goldsmith, his teacher Wolgemut was both a painter and a book illustrator, his godfather Koberger was the city’s foremost publisher. His apprenticeship completed, in 1490 Dürer embarked on his travels (Wanderjahre), honing his skills and gaining experience in the Rhineland. Returning to Nuremberg in 1494 he married Agnes Frey, set up his own workshop and began making and marketing his own prints, painting portraits of Nuremberg’s elite, and publishing his ground-breaking Apocalypse in 1498. Still only in his twenties, he was by now internationally famous.
