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Albrecht Dürer - St. Matthew, Martin Schongauer, German

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Martin Schongauer, also known as Martin Schön or Hübsch Martin by his contemporaries, was an Alsatian engraver and painter. He was the most important printmaker north of the Alps before Albrecht Dürer, a younger artist who collected his work.

Martin Schongauer, also known as Martin Schön ("Martin beautiful") or Hübsch Martin ("pretty Martin") by his contemporaries, was an engraver and painter. He was the most important printmaker north of the Alps before Albrecht Dürer. Famous even in his lifetime, Martin Schongauer elevated the engraving technique to a perfection surpassed only by Albrecht Dürer. His versatile pen lines of parallel and cross-hatched strokes, dots, delineate texture and form. Schongauer was born in about 1440 in Colmar, Alsace, probably the third of the four sons of Caspar Schongauer, a goldsmith from Augsburg who taught his son the art of engraving. Colmar, now in France, is where Schongauer established at Colmar a very important school of engraving, out of which grew the "Little Masters" of the succeeding generation, and a large group of Nuremberg artists. The main work of Schongauer's life was the production of a large number of beautiful engravings, which were largely sold, not only in Germany but also in Italy and even in England and Spain.

The term "Northern Renaissance" refers to the art development of c.1430-1580 in the Netherlands Low Countries and Germany. The Low Countries, particularly Flanders with cities Antwerp, Ghent, and Bruges, were, along with Florence, the most economically advanced region in Europe. As in Florence, urban culture peaked here. The common understanding of the Renaissance places the birth of the Renaissance in Florence, Italy. Rennaisance's ideas migrated to Germany from Italy because of the travels of Albrecht Dϋrer. Northern artists such as Jan van Eyck remained attached to Medieval traditions. In their paintings, Low Countries painters attempted to reproduce space, color, volume, and light as naturalistically as possible. They achieved the perfection of oil paint in the almost impossible representation of things and objects. Rather than draw upon Classical Greek and Roman aesthetics like their Italian counterparts, Northern European Renaissance artists retained a Gothic sensibility of woodblock printing and illuminated manuscripts which clearly distinguished Northern Rennaisance art from Italian. Unlike Italian artists, northern painters were not interested in rediscovering the spirit of ancient Greece. Instead, they sought to exploit the full potential of oil paint, and capture nature exactly as they found it. Unlike their Italian counterparts, who embraced a mathematically calculated linear perspective and constructed a picture from within, Dutch artists used an empirical perspective with precise observation and knowledge of the consistency of light and things. They painted as they saw and came very close to the effect of central perspective. Long before Leonardo, they invented aerial and color perspectives. More, as with real-world human vision, their far-away shapes lose contours, and the intensity of the colors fades to a bluish hue. Robert Campin (c.1378-1444), was noted for works like the Seilern Triptych (1410) and the Merode Altarpiece (1425); Jan van Eyck (1390-1441) was noted for the Ghent Altarpiece (1432) and The Arnolfini Marriage (1434); Jan Eyck's pupil Petrus Christus (c.1410-75), best known for his Portrait of a Young Girl (1470, Gemaldegalerie, Berlin); Roger Van der Weyden (1400-64) noted for his extraordinary realism as in his masterpiece Descent From the Cross (Deposition) (1435), for the Church of Notre Dame du Dehors (now in the Museo del Prado, Madrid); Dieric Bouts (1420-75) for his devotional pictures; Hugo Van Der Goes (1440-82) famous for The Portinari Altarpiece (1475) which influenced the Early Renaissance in Florence; Hieronymus Bosch (1450-1516) noted for The Garden of Earthly Delights (1510-15) and other moralizing works; Joachim Patenier (1485-1524) the pioneer landscape painter; and Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c.1525-1569) known for landscape narratives such as The Tower of Babel (1563).

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martin schongauer drawings ink style of martin schongauer matthew germany 14th century historical images high resolution ultra high resolution german engraver german art engraving prints albrecht durer german german master prints northern renaissance metropolitan museum of art medieval art
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1400 - 1499
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Hübsch Martin Schongauer

Martin Schongauer, also known as Martin Schön - German, engraver and painter.

Northern Renaissance

Northern Rennaisance Art
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Metropolitan Museum of Art
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http://www.metmuseum.org/
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martin schongauer drawings ink style of martin schongauer matthew germany 14th century historical images high resolution ultra high resolution german engraver german art engraving prints albrecht durer german german master prints northern renaissance metropolitan museum of art medieval art