Ecce Homo

This scene of the presentation of Christ to the people, or ecce homo (“behold the man”) from the Engraved Passion series exemplifies Albrecht Dürer’s instinct for the graphic possibilities of the engraved line. Working with a burin on a copperplate, he crossed lines at different angles and varied the thickness of the lines to create dramatic tonal areas and highly descriptive textures. In this closely cropped composition, the focus on Christ’s clenched and pained body as he stands in judgment before a crowd contrasts with the disinterest emanating from the man standing calmly before him.