Augustiner Museum
Some outstanding pieces of art from the Middle Ages are arranged throughout a 13th-century Augustine church and monastery that’s been beautifully restored to show off the pieces to their best effect. Weathered red sandstone sculptures of 10 Old Testament prophets that once adorned the tower of the Minster are dramatically arrayed in two rows of the former nave, beneath gargoyles depicting the Seven Deadly Sins. The minster’s medieval gold and silver has been brought here for safekeeping, and the collection’s greatest treasure is “Miracle of the Snows” by Matthias Grünewald (1470–1528), depicting a miraculous August snowfall in 4th-century Rome. Little is known about Grünewald and all but 10 of his paintings were lost at sea when they were being carted off to Sweden as booty during the Thirty Years War; his great masterpiece, the Isenheim Altarpiece, is in Colmar, just across the border in France.
Some outstanding pieces of art from the Middle Ages are arranged throughout a 13th-century Augustine church and monastery that’s been beautifully restored to show off the pieces to their best effect. Weathered red sandstone sculptures of 10 Old Testament prophets that once adorned the tower of the Minster are dramatically arrayed in two rows of the former nave, beneath gargoyles depicting the Seven Deadly Sins. The minster’s medieval gold and silver has been brought here for safekeeping, and the collection’s greatest treasure is “Miracle of the Snows” by Matthias Grünewald (1470–1528), depicting a miraculous August snowfall in 4th-century Rome. Little is known about Grünewald and all but 10 of his paintings were lost at sea when they were being carted off to Sweden as booty during the Thirty Years War; his great masterpiece, the Isenheim Altarpiece, is in Colmar, just across the border in France.
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