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Your galleryHercules at the Crossroads
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Follow the stick raised by the clothed woman and the club held level by the hero, then find the small child running off at the right edge.
Renaissance humanists admired the heroes of antiquity so much that noble families had their family trees traced back to Hercules, the Art Institute notes. In this engraving of about 1498, a clothed woman raises a stick against a nude woman lying with a satyr, while the naked hero, seen from behind, holds his club between them. The title places Hercules at the crossroads, where he must choose his way in life.
Engraving in black on off-white laid paper · Image: 32.3 × 22.2 cm · Art Institute of Chicago · Northern Renaissance
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Details and source
- Museum title
- Hercules at the Crossroads
- Artist
- Albrecht Dürer German, 1471-1528
- Date
- c. 1498
- Medium
- Engraving in black on off-white laid paper
- Dimensions
- Image: 32.3 × 22.2 cm (12 3/4 × 8 3/4 in.); Plate: 32.5 × 22.5 cm (12 13/16 × 8 7/8 in.); Sheet: 34.4 × 24.2 cm (13 9/16 × 9 9/16 in.)
- Credit line
- Clarence Buckingham Collection
- Image license
- CC0 1.0 · Public domain
- Museum record
- Art Institute of Chicago
Artist’s life 1471–1528
View in the AtlasGaller’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.