The Virgin and Child on the crescent with a diadem.

One of the themes which most preoccupied the creative talents of Albrecht Dürer is that of the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child. His concern with this image was almost lifelong, and second only in importance to his involvement with the Passion of Christ. At first glance this could be taken to reflect the average Renaissance artist’s response to the prevailing concerns and commissions of the time, for the cult of the Virgin Mary reached a peak in Germany around 1500. Pilgrimage sites dedicated to the devotion of Mary displayed her relics at various times of the year, and each prominent town in Germany had a church dedicated to her.

In Nuremberg, Dürer’s home town, the Liebfrauenkirche was commissioned as early as 1349 by Emperor Charles IV, who dedicated it ‘to the honour of the principal intercessor of the Holy Roman Empire, the most pure Virgin Mary’. It stood in the centre of the city, facing Nuremberg’s newly established marketplace.

A chronological survey of Dürer’s works shows that he was involved with the subject matter throughout his mature career. In all, fourteen copperplate engravings of the Virgin and Child survive, and there are five woodcuts, about twenty paintings and over seventy drawings.

A distinctive feature of Dürer’s small-scale devotional images of the Virgin and Child is their repeatedly referred to ‘life-likeness’, all the more apparent for the seeming lack of dogmatic religious attributes. In the engravings Mary, following a popular northern European tradition, is predominantly shown seated outdoors on a bench, rarely ever on a throne, and never without the Christ Child. Generally Dürer omitted the crown as well as conventional halos for Mother and Son, unless presenting the latter as a heavenly vision, as in this engraving.

This engraving dates from 1514, the year of his mother Barbara Dürer's death. This event led not only to an intense exploration of his own state of mind in the most famous of all his prints, Melencolia I,  but also brought about the greatest concentration of works on the subject of the Virgin and Child. In this year, at least six drawings of the theme are recorded, together with two engravings: this one and Madonna by the Wall (also in the Te Papa collection, 1869-001-121).

This attractive silvery print was produced by a lightly and evenly engraved copper plate. The Virgin Mary is portrayed as a substantial woman holding a sturdy child. The crescent moon on which she stands, along with the rays of light that seem to emanate from her body, may refer to the description of the Virgin in the Book of Revelation as 'clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet' (12:1).

Te Papa also has in its collection The Virgin and Child on the crescent with a sceptre and a starry crown of 1516 (B.33), (1869-0001-119).

See Angela Hass, 'Albrecht Dürer's devotional images of the Virgin and Child', http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/essay/albrecht-durers-devotional-images-of-the-virgin-and-child/

Dr Mark Stocker, Curator Historical International Art  December 2016