By simple touch and beatific look, Albrecht Dürer connected mother to child with genuine affection. Mary and the infant Jesus correspond humbly in the everyday world of Dürer's Germany of 1495, rather than regally in a heavenly realm as had been the tradition in Christian art. Standard Christian symbols-a sleeping Joseph to signify Mary's perpetual virginity and a small dragonfly (or butterfly) at the lower right to foreshadow Christ's ultimate death and resurrection-are incorporated naturally into a vast and rich landscape. Stone buildings, waving grasses, leafy trees, wooden fences, and pliant fabrics are each articulated with confidently hatched lines, evidence of Dürer's mastery of forms and textures even early in his career.

The Virgin with the Dragonfly, engraved when Dürer was not yet twenty-five, is his first monogrammed print. By adding his initials, he claimed authorship and distinguished himself from the predominantly anonymous journeymen engravers of the preceding half-century. Dürer would become the first artist of genius whose international reputation was founded on his graphic work. The appearance of pirated versions of The Virgin with the Dragonfly, engraved elsewhere in Germany and Italy within five years of publication of the original, is evidence of Dürer's impact on his contemporaries.

The merchants of Italy, France, and Spain are purchasing Dürer's engravings as models for the painters of their homelands.
-Theologian Johannes Cochlaeus, 1512