Danube School

Danube school, German Donauschule, a tradition of landscape painting that developed in the region of the Danube River valley in the early years of the 16th century.

A number of painters are considered to have been members of the Danube school. Chief among them was the Regensburg master Albrecht Altdorfer (c. 1480–1538), whose real subject, although he often included figures in his compositions and gave some of his paintings religious titles, was nature; he saw man’s presence in nature as more or less incidental. Altdorfer’s interest in the changes caused by light at different times of the day and the changes of the seasons of the year, as well as the continuous cycle of growth, decay, and rebirth, link him spiritually with both Baroque and the 19th-century Romantic landscapists.

The early works of Lucas Cranach (1472–1553) are also typical of the Danube landscape style. Altdorfer’s landscapes can be characterized as poetic and enchanting, whereas Cranach’s were expressive and dramatic in contrast. In Cranach’s work the mood of nature has been adjusted to complement the subject.

Other important painters of this school include the Austrian Wolf Huber and the German Jorg Breu the Elder. Also notable was the German sculptor Hans Leinberger.