Main Campus - Tyler School of Art
Room: B004

One of the gems in the collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is an intriguing unfinished panel painting of "Jesus as the Salvator Mundi" by Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528). Part painting, part drawing, the panel reveals an unusually dense underdrawing by Dürer, especially in the area of the face. What questions does this painting raise about its own making and history? What is original to Dürer and what not? Was this painting part of a larger planned triptych? Was it perhaps a new independent showpiece by the artist, like his famous "Self-Portrait of 1500"? How can we tell? Dr. Ainsworth, curator of European Paintings at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, will use this case study as a way to introduce key concepts of technical art history. As an interdisciplinary method involving art historians, art conservators and scientists, technical art history is concerned with the processes of making art, its physical materials and structures and how works of art change over time, whether through the altering of materials or through more direct human intervention.