Master of the Virgo inter Virgines

The Master of the Virgo inter Virgines was a North Netherlandish painter and designer of woodcuts active around Delft between 1483 and 1498. He is named for The Virgin and Child with Four Holy Virgins, an altarpiece of the Virgin with Saints Catherine, Cecilia, Ursula, and Barbara which formerly hung in the convent of Konigsveld, but which is now in the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. He was first distinguished individually in 1903; based upon the style of the altarpiece a considerable body of work has since been built up. The Master has been described as the most uncompromisingly "realist" of his contemporaries, and not at all concerned with elegance; he has also been called a forerunner of the Dutch school of painting.