The artwork titled “Figure of Woman Shown in Motion,” created by Albrecht Dürer in 1528, is a woodcut piece that belongs to the Northern Renaissance art movement. This piece is classified as a sketch and study and forms part of Dürer’s series “Four Books of Human Proportion.” It can be found in the Albertina museum located in Vienna, Austria.
The image depicts a sketched figure of a woman drawn with careful attention to proportion and anatomy, as evidenced by the detailed grid and numerical annotations that appear throughout the image. These numbers and lines suggest that Dürer was interested in measuring and understanding the precise proportions of the human form, a common endeavor during the Renaissance when artists sought greater realism in their depiction of figures. The woman’s pose, with one arm stretched out and the other resting on her hip, appears to illustrate motion or balance. The large arc behind her may represent the path of movement or a geometric reference to enhance the study of proportion. Dürer’s work has provided fundamental insights into human anatomy and proportion for artists and scholars both in his time and subsequently.
