The National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo Presents Albrecht Dürer Religion / Portraits / Nature Prints and Drawings, open Tuesday 26 October 2010 – Sunday 16 January 2011.
Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528) noted in his Das Lehrbuch der Malerei, an art theory book for young people who wanted to be painters, that the most important things in art are “religion, portraits and nature.” This exhibition explores Dürer’s artistic philosophy through its exploration of his visualization of these themes. While recognized as a major German Renaissance painter, he played an even greater role as a printmaker. Dürer produced some extremely avant-garde works in the print arts, which were developing as part of the printing technology advances of the day.
This exhibition focuses on 105 prints from the collection of the National Gallery Victoria, Melbourne, Australia, combined with 49 prints from the NMWA collections and 3 drawings from the Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, for a total of 157 works. This exhibition marks the first display in Japan of the renowned Melbourne collection of Dürer works assembled at the end of the 19th century by the Englishman Barlow.
Organized by: National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo; Asahi Shimbun; National Gallery Victoria Melbourne
www.nmwa.go.jp