UNKNOWN MASTER, Flemish
(active around 1550 in Mechelen)

Domestic Altarpiece

c. 1550
Alabaster and oak, gilt and painted, 122 x 81 cm
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

This alabaster altarpiece, in which a relief is set in richly ornamented wooden frame, was made by the Mechelen alabaster industry which was founded by a small group of artists who worked at the beginning of the 16th century for the court of Margaret of Austria in the new Renaissance style that had been imported from Italy.