Copper Coin
Dürer's Young Hare

It may be more than half a millennium since it was painted but Albrecht Dürer’s ‘Young Hare’ still has an uncanny ability to move and fascinate. Probably the most famous depiction of an animal in the history of European art, the magnificent watercolour shows all the cuddly characteristics that have led this shy and lovable creature to take its place in Middle-European Easter tradition − and make it the ideal subject for our delightful Easter coin.       

Durable Dürer

Painted in Dürer’s workshop in Nuremberg in 1502, the ‘Feldhase’, as it is called in German, is the most iconic painting in the vast collection of Vienna’s Albertina museum. Another of Dürer’s masterpieces of observational art in the Albertina collection is the ‘Great Piece of Turf’, which forms the background to the hare on the coin’s reverse, above Dürer’s famous monogram. Painted with almost photographic accuracy, both watercolours are testament to the genius of their creator, whose powers of observation have never been equalled. A Renaissance man, both literally and figuratively, Albrecht Dürer 1471-1528 has been compared to Leonardo da Vinci for the breadth and depth of his artistic and intellectual pursuits. He was a printmaker, engraver and theorist, as well as a painter who pioneered the self-portrait, yet his watercolour of a hare is perhaps his most recognisable work. How he managed to capture such a detailed image of a wild and constantly moving animal remains a mystery, which no doubt adds to the enduring allure of the ‘Young Hare’.