Live Auction 7375The Genius of the German Renaissance: Prints by Albrecht Dürer
Albrecht Dürer
Lot 32

Albrecht Dürer

The Virgin and Child on a Crescent (B. 30; M., Holl. 29; S.M.S. 24)

Closed4 December 2007

Price Realised

GBP 5,625

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Albrecht Dürer
The Virgin and Child on a Crescent (B. 30; M., Holl. 29; S.M.S. 24)
engraving, circa 1499, a fine Meder a/b impression of this rare print, printing with a light tone, with part of a High Crown watermark (M. 20), with narrow margins, pale discolouration and touches of pen and ink along the platemark, otherwise in very good condition
P. 107 x 75 mm., S. 109 x 77 mm.

With P. & D. Colnaghi & Co., London.
G. Weiner (his stamp verso, not in Lugt).

Specialist note

The iconographic origin of this motif - the first of four by the artist (see also lots 102 and 103) - lies in the Apocalyptic Woman described in the Revelations of Saint John (Revelation 12. 1-2). In Dürer's delightful little engraving however, Mary does not appear as the majestic Queen of Heaven. Instead, it is a rather humble and intimate mother and child group which, in its reduction and simplicity, is reminiscent of Schongauer's Madonnas and female saints. After his very 'modern' Virgin and Child with the Monkey (see lot 30), Dürer here quite consciously returned to the late gothic type of the Schöne Madonna.