HOLBEIN, HANS, the ELDER. - German painter and engraver, born probably between 1460 and 1470 in Augsburg, died in 1524 at Isenheim.
Little is known of his life, and nothing of his artistic training; his earliest works, however, reveal a clear Flemish influence, as in the altarpiece for the Dominicans of Frankfurt am Main (1501). Toward the end, though fundamentally archaic in his dark-colored compositions, he changed his manner, adopting the achievements of the new art influenced by Italian art. Worth recalling are The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian, one of his masterpieces (ca. 1515), and The Fountain of Life (1519). He was also a renowned portraitist. His sons Ambrosius and the more famous Hans (the Younger) were likewise painters.
BIBL.: Glaser, s. V. in Thieme-Becker, XVII, pp. 333-35; O. Benesch, Beiträge zur oberschwöbischen Bildnismälern, in Jahrbuch der Preussischen Kunstsammlungen, 1933, pp. 338-54; A. A. Schmidt, Holbeinstudien, in Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, 1941-42, pp. 1-39. Gilberto Ronci