HEMMEL VON ANDLAU, Peter
German glass painter, born in Andlau, Alsace. His commissions and influence extended from the area around Strasbourg into southern Germany and Austria. Hemmel became a citizen of Strasbourg through marriage in 1447 with the widow of a local glass painter named Heinz. His work shows figure types similar to contemporary engravings, in particular those of Martin Schongauer; Hemmel’s Adoration of the Magi in the Nonnbergkirche, Salzburg, is derived from a Schongauer print of the same subject. Distinctive among his many commissions are the Kramer window (1479-80) in Ulm Minster and the axial choir window of St Anne and the Virgin (c. 1478-79) in the Stiftskirche, Tübingen. The balance of the intense purple, scarlet and deep blue against extensive silver-stain yellow and white glass creates a tension between spatial planes. Hemmel’s draughtsmanship in his Virgin and Child with Lily from the Nonnbergkirche, Salzburg (c. 1470-80; Darmstadt, Hessisches Landesmuseum), shows a sculptural treatment of drapery and form that dominates the composition. The extraordinarily lush treatment of the architectural frame, often developed through sprouting and intertwining branches, seen especially in large-scale work, is one of Hemmel’s most distinctive contributions.
The highly gifted Hemmel directed the Strassburger Werkstattgemeinschaft, a loose association of glass painters that operated in numerous sites across southern and central Europe, from Strasbourg to Vienna, between 1477 and 1499.
