Artists
Matthias Grünewald
- Country:
- Germany
- Birth year:
- 1470
- Death year:
- 1528
Mathis Grunewald (c.1475 Wurzburg? 1528 Halle an der Saale), who is probably the same individual as the painter Mathis Gothart Nithart, along with Albrecht Durer, he is the most outstanding artist of his age. Around 1509 he became the court painter for Archbishop Uriel von Gemmingen in Aschaffenburg, and directed the renovation of the palace there. In 1516 he went into the service of Cardinal Albrecht von Brandenbury (1490-1545), from whom he separated in the 1520s because of his own Lutheran convictions. He then went to Frankfurt and in 1527 he settled in Halle as a Wasserkunstmacher ("fountain artist"). Although Grunewald was aware of the innovations taking place in Italian and Dutch art, he nonetheless remained bound to medieval traditions. His art works are passionate sermons in which, through glowing colors and daring light effects, he grants a heretofore unknown and extremely intense expressiveness. Many of his works are lost, including three altarpieces he completed for the Mainz Cathedral. Other important works by the artist include Virgin and Child, c. 1518 Parish Church, Stuppach near Wurzburg, The Miracle of the snow at the Founding of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, 1519, Augustinermuseum, Freiburg im Breisgau; and Christ Carrying the Cross, c. 1523 Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe.