Stefan Lochner (the Dombild Master or Master Stefan; c. 1410 – late 1451) was a German painter working in the late International Gothic period. His paintings combine that era's tendency toward long flowing lines and brilliant colours with the realism, virtuoso surface textures and innovative iconography of the early Northern Renaissance. Based in Cologne, a commercial and artistic hub of northern Europe, Lochner was one of the most important German painters before Albrecht Dürer. Extant works include single-panel oil paintings, devotional polyptychs and illuminated manuscripts, which often feature fanciful and blue-winged angels. Today some thirty-seven individual panels are attributed to him with confidence.Chapuis, 103
Less is known of his life. Art historians associating the Dombild Altarpiece master with the historical Stefan Lochner think he was born in Meersburg in south-west Germany around 1410, and that he spent some of his apprenticeship in the Low Countries. Records further indicate that his career developed quickly but was cut short by an early death. We know that he was commissioned around 1442 by the Cologne council to provide decorations for the visit of Emperor Frederick III, a major occasion for the city. Records from the following years indicate growing wealth and the purchase of a number of properties around the city. Thereafter he seems to have over-extended his finances and fallen into debt. Plague hit Cologne in 1451 and there, apart from the records of creditors, mention of Stephan Lochner ends; it is presumed he died that year, aged around 40.
Lochner's identity and reputation were lost until a revival of 15th-century art during the early 19th-century romantic period. Despite extensive historical research, attribution remains difficult; for centuries a number of associated works were grouped and loosely attributed to the Dombild Master, a notname taken from the Dombild Altarpiece (in English cathedral picture, also known as the Altarpiece of the City's Patron Saints) still in Cologne Cathedral. One of Dürer's diary entries became key, 400 years later, in the 20th-century establishment of Lochner's identity. Only two attributed works are dated, and none are signed.Corley, 78 His influence on successive generations of northern artists was substantial. Apart from the many direct copies made in the later 15th century, echoes of his panels can be seen in works by Rogier van der Weyden and Hans Memling. Lochner's work was praised by Friedrich Schlegel and Goethe for its qualities, especially the "sweetness and grace" of his Madonnas.Borchert, 249
Identity and attribution
There are no signed paintings by Lochner, and his identity was not established until the 19th century. J. F. Böhmer in an 1823 article identified the Dombild (meaning "Cathedral picture") or Altarpiece of the City's Patron Saints with a work mentioned in an account of a visit to Cologne in 1520 in the diary of Albrecht Dürer. The notoriously thrifty artist paid 5 silver pfennigChapuis, 28 to see an altarpiece by "Maister Steffan" some seventy years after Lochner's death.Rowlands, 28 Although Dürer fails to mention specifically which of Maister Steffan's panels he had seen,Wolfson, 229–235 his description matches exactly the centre panel of the Dombild Altarpiece. The altarpiece is referred to in a number of other records. It was repaired and re-gilded in 1568, and mentioned in Georg Braun's Civitates Orbis Terrarum in 1572.Chapuis, 37
German Gothic art underwent a revival in the early 19th-century Romantic period when the work was seen as a climax of the late Gothic period. The German philosopher and critic Friedrich Schlegel was instrumental in reviving Lochner's reputation. He wrote lengthy tracts comparing the Dombild favourably to the work of Raphael, and thought it exceeded anything by van Eyck, Dürer or Holbein.Chapuis, 14 Later, Goethe was enthusiastic, emphasising Lochner's German "spirit and origin"; he described the Dombild as the "axis around which the ancient Netherlandish art resolves into the new".Chapuis, 17
Lochner's identity remained unknown for centuries, and no other known works were associated with the Dombild altarpiece. In 1816 Ferdinand Franz Wallraf identified him as Philipp Kalf, based on a reading of a name inscribed on the cloth of a figure on the right of the centre panel. He misinterpreted markings on the stone floor pictured in Annunciation to read 1410, which he took as the year of completion.Chapuis, 16 Johann Dominicus Fiorillo discovered a 15th-century record that read "in 1380 there was an excellent painter in Cologne called Wilhelm, who had no equal in his art and who depicted human beings as if they were alive".Eodem tempore 1380 Coloniae era pictor optimus, cui non fuit similis in arte sua, dictus fuit Wilhelmus, de pingit enim homines quasi viventes. See Chapuis, 33 In 1850 Johann Jakob Merlo identified "Maister Steffan" with the historical Stefan Lochner.Unverfehrt, 107
In 1862, Gustav Waagen became one of the first art historians to try to place Lochner's works in chronological order. His reasoning was based on the assumption that Lochner developed from the early idealised forms usually associated with early 15th-century Cologne and later absorbed the techniques and realism of the Netherlandish painters. In this way, he placed the lighter "gaiety" of Lochner's Madonna paintings from the beginning of his career with the more stern and pessimistic crucifixions and doom panels at the end. Today, art historians think the reverse to be true; the dramatic and innovative polyptychs came first, and the single Madonnas and panels of saints are from his mid-career.Chapuis, 19
Based on their similarity to the Altar of the City Patrons, art historians have attributed other paintings to Lochner, although a number have questioned whether the diary entry was authentically made by Dürer. Documentary evidence linking the paintings and miniatures with the historical Lochner has also been challenged, most notably by the art historian Michael Wolfson in 1996.Campbell Hutchison, Jane. "Image Making in Fifteenth-Century Cologne". Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art, November 2004. Retrieved 8 October 2015 In either case, the extent of Lochner's direct hand, as opposed to those of workshop members or followers, is debated.Chapuis, 261 Some panels formerly attributed to him are now thought to date from after 1451, the year of his death.Chilvers, 366
Life
The outline of the historical Stefan Lochner's life has been established from a small number of records, mostly relating to commissions, payments and property transfers.Chapuis, 293 There are no documents relating to his early life, a contributing factor being the loss of archival records from his supposed birthplace during the French occupation of Cologne.Chapuis, 26
The primary sources relating to Lochner's life are a June 1442 payment by the city of Cologne in relation to Friedrich's visit; deeds of 27 October 1442 and 28 August 1444 outlining the transfer of ownership of the house at Roggendorf; October 1444 deeds for the purchase of two houses in st Alban; his 24 June 1447 registration as a citizen of Cologne; his December 1447 election to the municipal council; his Christmas 1450 re-election to that post; an August 1451 correspondence with the city council; a 22 September 1451 announcement of the setting up of a plague graveyard next to his property, and finally, court records dated 7 January 1452 detailing the appropriation of his property.Chapuis, 293–98
Early life Through threadbare clues and supposition, mostly centred around a relatively wealthy couple that perished during a plague, thought to be his parents, Lochner is thought to have come from Meersburg, near Lake Constance. Georg and Alhet Lochner were citizens and died there in 1451. A "Stefan" is referred to as "Stefan Lochner of Constance" in two documents dated 1444 and 1448.Chapuis, 27 However, there is no archival evidence that he was there, and his style bears no trace of the art in that region.Borchert, 248 There are no further records of him or his family in the town except for a mention of Lochners (a fairly uncommon name) in the village of Hagnau, two kilometres from Meersburg.
However records indicate that Lochner's talent was recognised from an early age.Borchert, 70 He may have been of Netherlandish origin or worked there for a master, possibly Robert Campin. Lochner's work seems influenced by Jan van Eyck and Rogier van der Weyden; elements of their styles can be detected in the structure and colourisation of Lochner's mature works, especially in his Last Judgement,Stechow, 312 although neither is thought to be the master with whom he studied.Borchert, 71
Move to Cologne and success By the 1440s, Cologne was the largest and wealthiest city in the Holy Roman Empire. It controlled and taxed the passage of trade from Flanders to Saxony and became a financial, religious and artistic centre.Chapuis, 1 The city had a long tradition of producing high-quality visual art, and in the 14th century, its output was considered to be equal to that of Vienna and Prague. Cologne's artists concentrated on more personal and intimate subject matters, and the area became known for its production of small panels of "great lyrical charm and loveliness, which reflected the deep devotion of the writings of the German mystics".Wellesz, 3
During the 1430s, painting in Cologne had become conventional and somewhat old-fashioned, and still under the influence of the courtly style of the Master of Saint Veronica, active until 1420.Corley, 80 After his arrival Lochner, who was earlier exposed to the Netherlandish painters and already working in oils,Nash, 206 eclipsed other artists in the city.Walther, 318 According to the art historian Emmy Wellesz, after Lochner's arrival "painting in Cologne became infused with a new life", perhaps enriched by the earlier exposure to the Netherlandish artists. He became widely celebrated as the most capable and modern painter in the city, where he was known as "Maister Steffan zu Cöln".Borchert, 70–71
Lochner first appears in extant records in 1442, nine years before he died.Chapuis, 103 He moved to Cologne where he received a commission from the city council for the provision of decorations for the visit of Emperor Frederick III. Lochner was seemingly well established and although other artists were involved in preparing for the event, he was responsible for the most important arrangements. The centrepiece seems to have been the Dombild Altarpiece, described by modern art historians as "the most important commission of the fifteenth century in Cologne".Chapus, 156 He is recorded as having been paid forty marks and ten shillings for his effort.Chapuis, 26
Lochner bought a house with his wife Lysbeth around 1442. Nothing else is known about her and the couple apparently had no children. In 1444 he acquired two larger properties, the "zome Carbunckel", near Saint Alban Church,Singer, 16 and the "zome Alden Gryne". Historians have speculated whether these acquisitions indicate a need to house a growing group of assistants due to his rising commercial success. It is likely that he lived in one house and worked in the other. The purchases may have caused a strain; in around 1447 he seems to have encountered financial difficulties, and he was forced to remortgage the homes. Second mortgages were taken out in 1448.
Plague and death