LEU, Hans the Younger

Swiss painter and draughtsman. He probably served his apprenticeship in Zurich in the workshop of his father, Hans Leu I, who perhaps was one of the Carnation Masters. Travelling as a journeyman, soon after his father’s death, Hans the Younger apparently attached himself to Albrecht Dürer in Nuremberg. From the style of his free-hand drawings, it can be inferred that he also worked with Hans Baldung, perhaps in Strasbourg and no doubt, c. 1512-13, in Freiburg im Breisgau, where he may have painted the landscape backgrounds of Baldung’s Schnewlin Altar in the cathedral.

By 1514 Leu was active in Zurich, as is indicated mainly by his free-hand drawings. Lacking important commissions, he soon got into financial difficulties and, to improve his material position, served as a mercenary in the Duke of Württemberg’s Italian campaigns of 1515 and 1519, although Dürer attested (1523) to having met Leu in Zurich in 1519. The increasing impact of the Reformation, which put a halt to church commissions, forced Leu to ally himself to the Catholic party. He was stabbed to death during a skirmish between religious factions in Zurich.