Vanitas

Unknown artist

On the back of a men’s portrait in coal, which Heller was able to purchase from the collection of the Nuremberg Hans Albrecht von Derschau (1755-1824), there is the drawing of a standing female figure. Despite the fragmentary state, it is interpreted as a personification of vanitas because of its attribute, a hand mirror (cf. Kastenholz 2006, Cat. No. 250). Since the Bamberg collector considered the drawing of the front page, now attributed to Hans Schwarz, to be Dürer’s work, it was included in his Dürer publication, which was published in 1827 (see Heller Dürer 1827, II.30.57), without mentioning the sketch on the back.