In the 2024 Thaw Lecture, Stephanie Buck, Director of the Kupferstich-Kabinett at the Dresden State Art Collections, and the Drawing Institute’s 2024 Thaw Senior Fellow, explored the interstices of some of the Morgan’s finest early German drawings, among them Dürer’s enigmatic Abduction on Horseback and the Head of an Elderly Man attributed to Sebald Beham. Buck argued that the scarcity of written sources from the period requires us to focus on the process of making through close looking, including technical examination. She considered the relationship between drawing and printmaking, noting how this leads to a more nuanced understanding of the intrinsic artistic meaning and function of drawings, which may change over time. More broadly, the lecture considered questions of how drawings were used in Northern artists’ workshops during the fifteenth- and sixteenth centuries.
Sponsored by the Morgan Drawing Institute, the annual Thaw Lecture aims to address critical topics in the study of drawings.
Held Tuesday, December 10, 2024.