Albrecht Dürer (1471 - 1528) - "San Gerolamo penitente nel deserto”, 1496

\Artist: Albrecht Dürer (1471 - 1528)
Technique: Bulino\Signature: Plate signed\Dimensions: 1_265_360_mm
Excellent print in very good condition, dateable around the end of the XVIII / early XIX century, with good margins. Shortly after returning from his trip to Italy, Durer was about to make this representation of his favourite saint; He depicts him in the desert, a rare iconography for northern Europe, whose artists generally preferred to depict the saint in his cell intent on translating the Bible into the vernacular. The San Gerolamo penitente is evidently of Italian origin; Durer, at the height of his enthusiasm for the "modern" and the darmatic, took him directly from north-Italian sources, portraying him with a scenic system similar to that of the Prodigal Son, that is, by inserting the saint kneeling slightly off-center and surrounding him with a romantic landscape, evidently the result of careful studies from life. The specific iconography of this plate can be traced back to the four years in which St. Jerome lived in the desert. Born around 347 in Dalmatia, Jerome converted in 375; after four years as an anchorite in the desert, he dedicated the next forty-five years to the translation of the Holy Scriptures. He died in 420 at a monastery he founded in Bethlehem. Interestingly, Albrecht Dürer was more grateful for his efforts as a translator than Martin Luther. Meder 57 d/g Certified work.