Albertus Pictor — the great church painter of the Middle Ages

Albertus Pictor is the great artist of the 15th century in our part of the world. He painted his fantastic scenes in 35 Swedish churches. In Fjärdhundraland there are ten of them, some with very well preserved pictures, others in a slightly worse condition. Take a trip in the footsteps of Albertus Pictor! Between the churches you travel the same medieval roads that Albertus travelled on. This is an excursion to the 15th century ... but with better food.By the 15th century, the new-fangled fine material brick used in fine buildings in Stockholm and in the large cathedrals. When the churches in Mälardalen were renovated, the modern material also made its way here. Uppsala Cathedral was inaugurated in 1435 — towards the end of the 15th century, many small churches were added brick vaults in brick instead of the old wooden roofs. The arches were also to be painted with biblical motifs and a painter was called in.The most prominent and active church painter in the late 15th century was Albert Painter, Albertus Pictor, who from his workshop in Stockholm went out to churches in Uppland, Västmanland, Södermanland and Norrbotten. He and his assistants painted biblical motifs, but with unusually vivid, individual people in the main roles, in the clothing of the time. It is speculated that he used local people as models.No surface was left empty, but instead was filled with vines and with small imaginative figures, caricatures, monsters, exotic animals and other things that must have aroused the wonder of the congregation as they sat listening to a sermon in Latin. Today we are inundated with images, but Albertus is said to have brought a whole new dimension to the people in the pews, bringing the Bible stories to life and awakening the imagination of worlds beyond the everyday.Read more about Albertus Pictor on Wikipedia.