Pleydenwurff, Hans

(1420-1472)

   The most important painter in Nuremberg, Germany, in the third quarter of the 15th century. Originally from Bamberg, Pleydenwurff arrived in Nuremberg in c. 1451, where he remained until his death in 1472. His Descent from the Cross (1462; Nuremberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum), originally part of the Breslau Altarpiece, is typical of his style and reveals his debt to the Early Netherlandish masters in the solidity of the figures, their deep pathos, and the angularity of their drapery folds. More vertical in terms of the compositional arrangement than Early Netherlandish prototypes, the work includes a patterned gold brocade sky that flattens the background space. In a later version of the scene (c. 1470; Munich, Alte Pinakothek), originally one of the panels of the Hof Altarpiece, Pleydenwurff exchanged the gold brocade for a true blue sky. He also increased the solidity of the figures and gave them a greater sense of movement, contrasting the compact arrangement of the figures in the foreground with the ample landscape in the back-ground. In his Resurrection (c. 1470; Munich, Alte Pinakothek) also part of the HofAltarpiece, these contrasting elements of closed and opened spaces is also seen. His portrait Count Georg von Loewenstein (c. 1456; Nuremberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum) is a naturalistic, nonidealized rendition of an aging male also inspired by Flemish precedents. Originally the work formed part of a diptych, with the Man ofSorrows on the accompanying panel. When together, the count, with book of devotions in hand, seemed to be meditating on the suffering of Christ. Along with Stephan Lochner and Konrad Witz, Pleydenwurff was among the first artists in Germany to experiment with the Flemish naturalism recently introduced by Robert Campin, Jan van Eyck, and Roger van der Weyden, thereby inaugurating a new phase in the art of the region.