Christ into Limbo, from The Fall and Redemption of Man
Medium
Woodcut in black on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image/block: 7.2 × 4.8 cm (2 7/8 × 1 15/16 in.)
Classification
woodcut
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
27595
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
Albrecht Altdorfer, known as one of the Little Masters (in German, Kleinmeister) along with Georg Pencz and the brothers Barthel and Sebald Beham, excelled at creating prints on a minute scale, whether in intaglio or relief. This woodcuts is part of a series entitled The Fall and Redemption of Man contrasting the expulsion of Adam and Eve from paradise with Christ’s Passion narrative. Connoisseurs would have collected these diminutive prints as an entire cycle and often pasted them into albums.
About the Artist
Albrecht Altdorfer · 1475–1538
Albrecht Altdorfer (c. 1480–1538) was a German painter, printmaker, and draftsman who stands as one of the founders of landscape painting as an independent genre. Born in Regensburg or nearby Altdorf, he learned art from his father Ulrich, a painter and miniaturist. Altdorfer spent most of his life in Regensburg, becoming a citizen in 1505 and later serving as the city's official architect and a m...