Portrait Diptych of Dürer's Parents Portrait Diptych of Dürer's Parents Portrait Diptych of Dürer's Parents (or Dürer's Parents with Rosaries) is the collective name for two late-15th century portrait panels by the German painter and printmaker Albrecht Dürer. They show the artist's parents, Barbara Holper (c. 1451–1514) and Albrecht Dürer the Elder (c. 1427–1502), when she was around 39 and he was 63 years. The portraits are unflinching records of the physical and emotional effects of ageing. The Dürer family was close and Dürer may have intended the panels either to display his skill to his parents or as keepsakes while he travelled soon after
Early Netherlandish painting reflection and prayer was encouraged and the small-scale diptych fitted this purpose. It became popular among the newly emerging middle class and the more affluent monasteries across the Low Countries and northern Germany. Ainsworth says that regardless of size, whether a large altarpiece or a small diptych, Netherlandish painting is a "matter of small scale and meticulous detail". The small size was meant to entice the viewer into a meditative state for personal devotion and perhaps the "experience of miraculous visions". Late 20th-century technical examination has shown significant differences in technique and style between the panels of individual diptychs. The