German painter (b. 1472, Kronach, d. 1553, Weimar). German painter and engraver. The son of a painter, he settled in Wittenberg c.1504 and was court painter successively under three electors of Saxony. There he maintained a flourishing workshop and was twice burgomaster. Cranach was a close friend of Martin Luther, whose doctrine he upheld in numerous paintings and woodcuts, and he has been called the painter of the Reformation. He was a rapid and prolific painter, and the work turned out by his studio is uneven in quality. Naïve and fanciful, often awkward in draftsmanship, it has, nonetheless, freshness and originality and a warm, rich palette. His portraits are particularly successful. Among his best-known works are Repose in Egypt (Gemäldgalerie, Staatliche Mus., Berlin-Dahlem); Judgment of Paris (Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe); Adam and Eve (Courtauld Inst., London); and Crucifixion (Weimar). The latter contains figures of Luther and Cranach. His many famous protraits include those of Elector John Frederick and Self-Portrait (Uffizi). Cranach was also an accomplished miniaturist. He produced a few copperplates and designs for woodcuts. His son and pupil Lucas Cranach, the Younger, 1515C86,   Related Paintings of CRANACH, Lucas the Elder :. | Altarpiece of the Holy Family dsf | Self-Portrait in61 | Cupid Complaining to Venus df | Portrait of Johann Friedrich the Magnanimous at the Age of Six | The Trinity dsg |
Related Artists:
MORONI, Giovanni Battista
Italian Mannerist Painter, ca.1520-1578 .Italian painter. He was the most significant painter of the 16th-century school of Bergamo and is best known for his portraits, which feature a naturalistic rendering of both faces and costume and an objective approach to character.
Michael Conrad Hirt
painted Portrait of Anna Rosina Tanck, wife of the mayor of Lubecker in1642
Marcus Stone
British 1840-1921 English painter, son of Frank Stone, ARA, was trained by his father and began to exhibit at the Academy before he was eighteen; and a few years later he illustrated with much success books by Charles Dickens, Anthony Trollope, and other writers, friends of his family. He was elected an associate of the Royal Academy in 1877, and academician in 1887. In his earlier pictures he dealt much with historical incidents, but in his later work he occupied himself chiefly with a particular type of dainty sentiment, treated with much charm, refinement and executive skill.