1232

Creator

Hans Burgkmair the elder (1473-1531)

Title

Black youth dressed in a feather costume

Material

pen and black ink, with brown, black and grey wash

Measurements

235 x 160 mm

Description

The figure on the recto is a composite of a black African, wearing Brazilian clothing, and carrying an Aztec shield. The shield is very close to a mosaic shield in the Museum für Völkerkunde in Vienna, and this drawing provides the best evidence that that object was part of the group sent back from Mexico by Cortes in 1519. See T.Falk, 'Burlington Magazine', May, 1995, p.325. Burgkmair probably knew an anonymous woodcut published in Augsburg in 1505 which shows Tupinamba Indians (coastal Brazil) wearing feather headdresses and skirts, see J.M. Massing, 'Early European Images of America: the ethnographic approach', in 'Circa 1492: Art in the Age of Exploration', Washington National Gallery of Art, 1991-2, pp.515ff. and nos.405A and B. Also William C. Sturtevant, 'The sources for European imagery of Native Americans' in 'New World of Wonders' , edited by Rachel Doggett et al, Washington D.C. 1992, pp.25ff. Dagmar Eichberger, Dürer's Nature Drawings and early collecting', in 'Dürer and his culture' edited by DE and Charles Zika, CUP, 1998, pp.18f.