Heller Altarpiece

The Heller Altarpiece was commissioned by the Frankfurt merchant Jakob Heller in 1508-1509. Though Dürer's original central panel was destroyed by fire in 1729 and is known only from a copy, the surviving wing panels demonstrate the monumental ambition of this major altarpiece commission Albrecht Dürer brought Italian Renaissance ideas north, combining German Gothic tradition with classical proportions to become the dominant artist in the German-speaking world.

The surviving wing panels display Dürer's precise technique and complex compositional design, while the lost central Assumption was recorded as one of his most ambitious experiments in Italian-influenced colorism.