Martin Schaffner

1477 – 1549

German painter and medallist. He produced some of the outstanding altarpieces of the Renaissance in Swabia. His birthdate is suggested by a self-portrait medal of 1522 (Munich, Staatliche Münzsammlung) on which he describes himself as aged 44. He was obviously trained in Jörg Stocker's workshop in Ulm: his name first appears on the reverse side of the winged altar made by Stocker in 1496 for St Martin at Ennetach (Sigmaringen Castle), where he signed the Carrying of the Cross. Yet Schaffner's contribution here would have been confined to subsidiary details; Stocker, a rather conservative and spiritless artist, could have imparted only basic painting skills to the young painter. An altar wing with paintings on both sides (1500; Ulm, Museum), perhaps also painted by Schaffner in Stocker's studio, seems old-fashioned, though not totally devoid of the charm of his later figures. Schaffner was a taxpaying householder in Ulm in 1499, suggesting that he had meanwhile become an independent master, free to develop along his own lines. From 1510 his paintings show plastic forms, light colours and effective light and shade tones. After 1526 he was a city painter in Ulm, and in the last 30 years of his life he was the only significant representative of the Ulm painting school.

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