High altar of Freiburg Minster

Baldung Grien's high altar of Freiburg Minster, completed in 1516, is his masterwork and one of the supreme achievements of German Renaissance painting. The altarpiece was commissioned for the cathedral of Freiburg im Breisgau, where Baldung had settled after his training with Dürer, and its complex program of wings depicting the Coronation of the Virgin, the Twelve Apostles, and other subjects demonstrated his ability to sustain artistic quality across a multi-panel program of exceptional scale. The altarpiece was completed the same year that Luther posted his Ninety-Five Theses, making it one of the last major pre-Reformation altarpiece commissions in Germany; its Catholic theological program would soon be challenged by the Reformation's hostility to sacred imagery.

The altarpiece's multiple panels display Baldung's distinctive color sense with vivid, almost iridescent hues, while the complex narrative scenes demonstrate his command of large-scale multi-figure composition.