Getty Museum

Mountain Landscape with an Imaginary City

Hanns Lautensack

Date

1554–1555

Medium

Black ink, lead white highlights, on red prepared paper

Culture

German

Department

Drawings

Institution

Getty Museum

In Hanns Lautensack's imaginary city, the upward sweep of the pointed architecture echoes the towering mountains' vertical lines. The artist applied the white highlights economically, creating a sparkling effect on the dark red prepared paper. The brilliant whites also suggest nocturnal illumination, heightening the drama of this otherwise static scene. Either in the background of a composition or as the subject itself, landscape played a important role in the works of a group of draftsmen known as the Danube School. These artists from the southern part of Germany then known as Bavaria focused on prominent elements in their native landscape, such as mountains and trees, as embodiments of nature's superhuman power.

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