Marshall McLuhan got it at least half right. The medium may not always be the entire message, but it certainly dictates the kind of message that can be transmitted. This is one lesson of Drawing in Silver and Gold: Leonardo to Jasper Johns, an exhibition at the British Museum that is packed with subtle masterpieces, and as a bonus contains — for those who like such things — two of art’s great studies of dogs.
I might as well start with those: one by Albrecht Dürer from around 1520, ‘Dog resting’, and the other by the later Dutch artist Hendrick Goltzius of his own pet, curled up and sleeping in about 1597. Both of these display the virtues of silverpoint. It is a medium that is marvellously well adapted to depicting the surfaces of things — such as the hairs of a canine coat, or the shine of a doggy nose.
It was also a good sketching medium, you could take your little book of prepared paper with you, the metal stylus tucked into the cover.
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