A YOUNG HARE is made by Albrecht Durer( 1471-1528 ).
Albrecht Durer (DYOO rer) was born in Nuremberg, Germany. We know little about his early life except the fact that he was the son of a goldsmith and had seventeen brothers and sisters. We know a lot about him as a man because of the abundance of art works he left and his writings. He seemed to realize he would become famous and wanted people to know a lot about him and the pictures he made.

Also ten letters survive that he wrote to his friend Willibald Pirckheimer. They remained lost for 200 years until they were discovered hidden in a wall.

He made a thousand drawings and watercolors and is considered to be the greatest printmaker of all time. He liked making prints because he could make many reproductions of the same picture, and it was a lucrative business. He made a good profit from it. He made over 350 engravings and woodcuts. Connecticut College presents a large collection of Durer woodcuts.

Sixty of his oil paintings remain. He was the first artist to paint portraits of himself. Let's examine four of his self-portraits.

The first drawing he made of himself was done in 1484 when he was thirteen years old. He used a mirror and drew his likeness. He said, "I drew it when I was still a child."

The first painted self-portrait was done when he was twenty-two years old. He married Agnes Frey in 1494 during this time of his life.

When he was twenty-six he painted a portrait of himself as a young man dressed in elegant clothes. His friend said the painting was so realistic that Durer's dog barked and wagged his tail when he saw it.

The fourth portrait was painted when he was twenty-eight years old. (You can look at a larger view of that portrait.)

The featured work on this page is A Young Hare which was done in watercolor in 1502.

He died in 1528 at the age of fifty-six.

Today if you go to Nuremberg you can visit the four-story Durer House and observe museum workers reproducing some of Durer's woodblock prints.