Albrecht Dürer: Observational Animal Print

• Albrecht Dürer was a painter from Germany during the Northern Renaissance. Students learned about this print of a rhinoceros. We looked carefully at the ways in which the artist's representation suffers in terms of accuracy due to his never having actually seen a rhinoceros. All his sources were second-hand.
• Students were assigned an animal and made two draft sketches based on close observation of the animals features and proportions. These sketches were then used to create a foam plate from which the students could pull prints.
• This project connected to our STEM theme by utilizing the skill of observation and by demonstrating the influence of technology (the printing press) on world history.