Jörg the Elder Breu

1475 – 1537

German painter and designer of woodcuts whose subjects included portraits, altarpieces and battle scenes. He was one of the leading painters of his time in Augsburg, but his most important works there - a series of frescoes in the town hall - are no longer extant. He was patronized by the emperor Maximilian and by Duke William IV of Bavaria, for whom he painted The Battle of Zama (Alte Pinakothek, Munich) in the same series as Altdorfer 's celebrated Battle of Issus. His style was complex, sharing something of Altdorfer's passion and love of landscape, and showing strong influence from Dürer and a journey he made to Italy in about 1514.

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