Revisiting Durer's Rhino

In 1515 the Renaissance artist Albrecht Durer created a woodcut illustration of a Rhinoceros.  The image was an instant hit, selling thousands of prints across Europe, as at that time no one, including Durer, (who worked from a simple sketch and description), had ever seen such an animal in the flesh. The image, although wildly inaccurate established Durer as a major artistic star and despite spending the majority of his life as a talented painter, he will always be associated with the exotic creature of his imagination.

From my days when I first came across it at college, the Durer woodcut has always been one of my favourite pieces of line art, and so when I was asked to revisit the image and create a version of my own for a well known German Bank, I jumped at the chance.  I must stress at this point that my artwork is in no way to be seen on the same level as the original, or compared in any way, but the brief allowed me to pay my respects to the original by creating my own version, based on slightly more accurate reference than was available to Durer.

The intention is that my image will be used within the clients' corporate literature but also reproduced as a large mural on the wall of the company boardroom.