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DURER Burins & Engravings

Albrecht Dürer mainly used two techniques in his artistic production: first the woodcut and later the burin. Suffice it to say that his entire artistic legacy that has come down to us consists of approximately 250 woodcuts, 100 engravings, 6 etchings and 3 puntesecche.

But what is the difference between these two techniques, which offer a similar end result, although that of the burin is more detailed?

Woodcut is a relief printing technique, i.e. it is obtained by bathing a matrix on which the parts to be printed are in relief with ink. The matrix is prepared by the artist by hollowing out areas in wooden boards that are to be blank. There are two types of boards: head wood, which is harder to work with and occurs when the wood is cut perpendicular to the grain, or wire wood, which is softer and is obtained from a longitudinal cut to the grain of the tree.
The board is prepared using different carving tools, also depending on the strokes to be carved. Subsequently, the entire surface is wet with ink using a roller, leaving the hollowed surfaces blank, thus printing a negative of what has been engraved.

The burin technique, on the other hand, is part of the cable printing techniques, i.e. the ink is released onto the sheet of paper by means of marks engraved on the surface of the matrix. Albrecht Dürer used copper matrices, which were engraved by means of a burin, i.e. a small steel chisel with a wooden handle that fit into the hollow of the engraver's hand. During the carving, curls of material are raised and then removed with a scraper that is used specifically to clean all the grooves. It is precisely the grooves that are then filled with ink and transmit what is drawn to the sheet of paper.

(Credits: Lorenzo Taccioli)