Tři stylové proměny v tvorbě Mistra Pavla z Levoče .......... 477

THREE STYLISTIC TRANSFORMATIONS IN THE WORK OF MASTER PAUL OF LEVOČA

The study deals with three stages in the life of the late Gothic sculptor Master Paul of Levoča (Pavol z Levoče). The first part is devoted to his beginnings in Nuremberg, the oldest work of the author, Jesus Riding a Donkey (Christus auf dem Palmesel), from the collections of the Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg. The dating to the 1480s is confirmed by analogies with Nuremberg painting and sculpture at that time. The second part concerns the reflection of the art of Gerhaert of Leyden and the Cracow altarpiece by Veit Stoss in The Nativity of Christ with the Adoration of the Shepherds group of sculptures (today in the Church of St. James in Levoča). A direct creative response is evident in this Nativity group only. In the Levoča main altar, the artist’s pivotal work, there is already a synthesis between “gerhaertism” and the desire of Paul of Levoča for an embodiment of the divine ideal in the form of an “imago pulchritudinis”, which begins in Nuremberg with his Christ on a donkey and his first large altar for Banská Bystrica. Shortly before 1516, a reaction to the Renaissance decoration “all’ antica”, personified by dolphins, among other things, appears in the work of Master Paul of Levoča. In his work, this motif appears at the same time as it appeared in Germany. The source of inspiration could have been the Italianising works in Hungary and perhaps the artist’s trip to Venice. The impetus was intense, because Paul himself became a promoter of dolphins and the decoration “all’ antica” not only in Levoča and Spišská Sobota, but also in Sabinov, where he himself or his collaborator probably created the altar of the Annunciation of the Virgin Mary (Magyar Nemzeti Galéria in Budapest).