Dürer and death: on the iconography of "Knight, Death and the devil"

• Autores: Jeroen Stumpel
• Localización: Simiolus: Netherlands quarterly for the history of art, ISSN 0037-5411, Vol. 34, Nº. 2, 2009-2010, págs. 75-88
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Drawing on a paper he presented at a symposium in the Boijmans Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam, on the occasion of the exhibition “Images of Erasmus,” the writer identifies the subject and meaning of Knight, Death and the devil, a print by Albrecht Dürer. This print depicts a man in armor on horseback, with two figures, a devil and Death, seeming to approach or follow him. The rider is not defying Death, but, rather, is depicted as being too careless to acknowledge its imminent presence. The rider lacks the prudence to consider his end in a timely manner, and this accounts for the greedy presence of the devil. This explanation not only has the virtue of simplicity, but also is in complete agreement with the numerous visual and textual references to death in the work of Dürer himself and of his contemporaries.