Albrecht Dürer and his Circle

Drawings by Hans Baldung Grien, Hans Schäufelein, Hans von Kulm­bach, and Hans Springinklee are among the rich holdings of late 15th and early 16th century art in the Kunstmuseum Basel’s Department of Prints and Drawings. For a while, these artists worked in the Nuremberg workshop of Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528), who stands at the center of this exhibition. Most of them subsequently set up their own workshops and employed other draftsmen and painters in turn. A group of drawings made between 1512 and 1516 in connection with the execution of the high altar in Freiburg Cathedral by Hans Baldung merits particular atten­tion, as it blends the master’s work with contributions by his associates. Thanks to the collecting activities of Basilius Amerbach in the second half of the sixteenth century, these drawings always remained together; with the acquisition of the Amerbach collection in the seventeenth century, they became part of the Öffentliche Kunstsammlung. The exhibition seeks to convey the significance of these works and their function.