In 1520 Albrecht Dürer left Nuremberg for a year-long trip to the Netherlands and this painting recreates a scene from his record of the journey. The artist is shown receiving a message from Margaret of Austria, Governor of the Habsburg Netherlands, requesting he visit her in Mechlin. Dürer recounts that during the subsequent visit he presented her with 'a whole set of all my works' and drew her two pictures on parchment - although he laments that she proved an ungenerous patron, giving him nothing in return.

Cat. 135