In the Libro dell’Arte, the famous treatise on painting, Cennino Cennini described drawing in light and dark on colored backgrounds around 1400 as “il principio e la porta del colorire”, the beginning and the gateway to painting. A century later, Leonardo would perfect the technique in his grandiose studies of nature. Albrecht Dürer followed his example with sheets such as the Praying Hands, one of the most famous works in the art of drawing. With Leonardo’s and Dürer’s works, the study in chiaroscuro was finally recognized as a highly artificial art genre.

While the chiaroscuro drawing had a firm place in the work process in Italy, it was favored north of the Alps for delicate scenic depictions from the mid-15th century onwards. These were never design drawings, but precious showpieces. Outstanding examples of this are sheets by Albrecht Altdorfer, Hans Baldung Grien and finally Dürer’s famous Green Passion. The many subjects from history, mythology and popular beliefs alone demonstrate that the artists were targeting the desires of a new, educated clientele.

The ALBERTINA Museum’s exhibition uses carefully selected works from its own holdings and topclass loans from international collections to illustrate the functions of color ground drawings in the South and the North, the expressive possibilities the technique offered artists and the links to contemporary printmaking. It will offer visitors a special aesthetic pleasure and reveal to laymen and connoisseurs alike how master draughtsmen such as Leonardo and Dürer pushed the door to painting wide open and crossed the threshold to art for art’s sake.