Master of the Friedrich Altarpiece

In 1447 Frederick III, then King of the Romans and later Holy Roman Emperor, gave a carved altarpiece to the Neukloster church in Wiener Neustadt, the town south of Vienna where he kept his court. Its painted wings, with rows of saints and, on the base, scenes from Christ's childhood and Passion, give an anonymous court painter his name, the Master of the Friedrich Altarpiece. Since 1884 the altarpiece has stood in St Stephen's Cathedral in Vienna.

He worked between about 1440 and 1460 in Vienna or Wiener Neustadt. His workshop is credited with an altarpiece in the hospital church at Bad Aussee in Styria and with the painted outer wings of a carved altarpiece from Znojmo in Moravia, now in the Belvedere. The Belvedere's paintings by him include an Adoration of the Magi and a scene of an angel with Saint Catherine in prison, both from the 1440s.