The Negative space of Albrecht Durer

Posted by Mical Rin May 07, 2017

The Negative space of Albrecht Durer

Several of Albrecht Dürer's prints and artwork in other mediums have hidden images in the negative space or whitespace. Artists exploit the human brain's perceptual process by which we determine through color, form, border, and line what is the background of a given scene or image and what is the subject of a given scene or image. This is a field of study that has preoccupied psychologist and those looking to exploit the ability to insert subliminal messages into visual mediums.

Apocalypse series:
St. John Beholding 7 Golden Candlesticks

Apocalypse: St. John Beholding 7 Golden Candlesticks

After performing some f igure–ground reversal, switching the white/negative space with the foreground\positive space, and drum roll please..... Behold God is riding a giant spider bat!

Apocalypse: St. John Beholding 7 Golden Candlesticks in Negative Space

Adoration of the Trinity, by Albrecht Dürer, is a complex, comical and sophisticated commentary on the rulers of Europe, especially those related to the Holy Roman Empire, and the House of Habsburg. Adoration of the Trinity by Albrecht Dürer was painted between 1509 and 1511 A.D. It is an oil on wood panel painting meant to serve as an altarpiece painting in a chapel.

You can view and download several different sizes of the image file

at Wikipedia Adoration of the Trinity.

There are several different things going on in this amazing painting. We may briefly explore some of the political drama and social commentary Dürer is making with this painting. The Primary emphasis of this article is to prove, validate and make public the images and messages hidden in the negative space which is intentional and pertinent to the artwork, the artist, and the socio\political climate.

Albrecht Dürer, lower right corner of Adoration of the Trinity.

Albrecht Dürer, grey scale Adoration of the Trinity.

After dropping out all of the color data by turning the image mode to grayscale. I perform some f igure–ground reversal, essentially taking the foreground and placing it in the background and then conversely taking the background and placing it in the foreground. I do this by using the selection tool in Photoshop, with threshold set between 5 and 7, and the "contiguous" option deselected, I will either select the black and other dark features. Then bring up a new layer, use the fill command to place white on top of what I have selected. Then I will choose "Select inverse" and use the fill command again to place black on what has now been selected. The results vary, It is not really a science but more of an art form.

ADORATION OF THE TRINITY foreground/background reversal.

Let us focus on the lower right-hand corner of the art piece.
Using the sign as a reference point we can find the artist Albrecht Durer who is now in foreground/background reversal. Durer now has a very large bat face on the back of his coat, as well as some other creatures.

The first creature to take note of is a white unicorn that has been outlined for us in the image below.

And the Second creature is also a unicorn but this time a black unicorn outlined for us in the image below

Finally the bat nose, which if we notice the latin below 'bat' is also in the latin wording for Durer's statement. The bat nose is a direct allusion to the "Apocalypse: St. John Beholding 7 Golden Candlesticks" at the beginning of this article.

THE MISSING 'E' FROM TAPESTRY 6 "UNICORN KILLED AND BROUGHT TO CASTLE"

To orient the reader I have provided an image of tapestry 6. In the upper right-hand corner of the tapestry, the questionable 'E' appears to be missing.

Unicorn Killed and Brought to Castle

In nearly every tapestry in this series there is a monogram in every corner, but the upper right-hand corner of tapestry 6 the right half of the monogram is missing.