PENCZ, Georg

This panel, together with three other small paintings in the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum of Sts John the Baptist, John the Evangelist and Christopher, was originally part of a triptych, of which the central panel might have been a Crucifixion or a Virgin.

This engraving belongs to a series of Seven Virtues. Pencz depicted the Virtues naked or nearly so in an antique manner in classical interiors. He probably made the series in Italy.

Desiderius Erasmus (1467-1536) was the most celebrated humanist north of the Alps and in certain ways a pioneer of the Reformation. Using the philological methods pioneered by Italian humanists, he helped lay the groundwork for the historical-critical study of the past, especially in his studies of the Greek New Testament and the Church Fathers. His educational writings contributed to the replacement of the older scholastic curriculum by the new humanist emphasis on the classics.

Count Palatine Ottheinrich (1502-1559), Regent of the principality of Pfalz-Neuburg, later Elector in Heidelberg, was one of the most prominent German collectors of books. His name is linked to the richly illustrated, unusually large manuscript of a New Testament in German translation.

For his Portrait of Martin Luther, Georg Pencz openly draws inspiration from the famous painting by Lucas Cranach. Painting his portrait in 1533, Pencz seems to take inspiration from the matching piece of Luther and his wife Katharina von Bora painted in 1528, versions of which are kept in the museums of Weimar and Darmstadt.

The components of this type of portrait with its three-quarter pose, dark clothing and doctoral cap, became characteristic in the portrayal of the theologian. They are the symbols of the Reformation, as well as bearing witness to the period of power of this Augustinian monk at the origin of the movement that spread like wildfire in Germany and Europe.

This portrait belongs to a series of portraits representing monumental, wise old men. The finely painted beard and fur are remarkable.

Pencz was above all a portrait painter, although he is remembered mostly for the tiny engravings which still place him among the ranks of the so-called German ‘small masters’. In this work Pencz presents a vigorous image of a young man, painting full of of plastic force and psychological tension, and one that reveals the importance which portrait-painting had in that period of German art which we could call late Renaissance.