Stéfan Lochner (German, c.1400-c.1453) was born in the region of Meersburg on the shores of Lake Constance c.1400 (others sources state c.1410), and some sources say he died in Cologne in 1451 (the same year as his parents deaths) when there was an outbreak of widespread plague running rampant that year, though others doubt that date and put his death after about 1453. He stated to have been a pupil of the Wilhelm Meister of Cologne, and he was usually called Etienne de Cologne or Master Stéphan by his pupils and is considered by some to be the most important painter of the 15th century and was also called the, “Master of the Dombild” (“Master of Cathedral Painting”). He also never signed any of his paintings and his identity was not established until the 19th century.
“A document of 16 August 1451 implies that an artist called Stefan Lochner came from Meersburg, Lake Constance. This artist was recorded in Cologne from 1442; he was elected town councillor by the painters' guild in 1447 and in 1450 and references to him cease at the end of 1451, a year in which plague broke out in Cologne. There are no pictures signed by Lochner, but it was assumed from the note in his diary that Albrecht Dürer saw the 'Adoration of the Magi' in the Rathaus chapel in 1520 (now in Cologne Cathedral) and that it was painted by 'maister Steffan zu Cöln'. It is now thought that this artist is not necessarily the one who died in 1451, because the painter of the 'Adoration' has been plausibly associated with a Book of Hours in Darmstadt dated 1453, and is considered to have come from the Cologne area, rather than Lake Constance. Other paintings attributed to Lochner on the basis of the 'Adoration of the Magi' include: the 'Madonna in the Rose Garden' (Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz Museum); 'the Presentation in the Temple', dated 1445 (Lisbon, Museu Calouste Gulbenkian); 'the Presentation in the Temple', dated 1447 (Darmstadt, Hessisches Landesmuseum); and two wings with saints from an altarpiece which has been dated from dendrochronological evidence to 1454 (London, National Gallery and Cologne, Wallraf-Richartz Museum).” (Source: britishmuseum.com)
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