The Ill-Assorted Couple (The Offer of Love)

Albrecht Dürer resorted to legal action to protect his artworks from copyists, based in part on Marcantonio Raimondi’s practice of reissuing woodcuts from Dürer’s Life of the Virgin book as engravings. This secular engraving (representing two lovers acting out of ulterior, financial motives) is one case in which the print media matches the original. Stylistically, there is no comparison between the intricacy of Dürer’s lines and Marcantonio’s dryer flecks and outlines. But contemporary buyers did not always know the difference. Although Dürer won the right to exclusive use of his “AD” monogram, the Venetian senate ruled that his images could still be copied.