AMBERGER, CHRISTOPH. - German painter and wood engraver, b. about 1500, d. between 1561 and 1562. He belonged to the Augsburg school, BURGKMAIR, HANS (v.), and the Venetians (Tiziano, Bordone), avoiding, unlike the German Mannerists after him, AACHEN (v.), the influence of the Tuscan Mannerists. In Augsburg there are altarpieces by his hand in the Cathedral (1554) and in the church of S. Anna (1560), and several Madonnas in the gallery. He was the best portraitist after Holbein, as is shown by the portrait of Carlo V in the Berlin Museum, of which a copy exists in Siena. He supplied drawings for the tomb of Emperor Massimiliano at Innsbruck.
BIBL.: A. Haesler, A., Königsberg 1894; M. J. Friedlaender, s. V. in Thieme-Becker, I, p. 387; A. Feulner, in Buchner-Feuchtmayr, Beitr. II, Augsburg 1928, p. 442; G. Dehio, Geschichte der Deutschen Kunst, III, Berlino 1931, p. 127; K. Feuchtmayr, C. A. und Jörg Hermann, in Münchener Jahrbuch d. Bild. Kunst, nuova serie, 13 (1938-39), pp. 79-86. Bernardo Degenhart