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Lot Essay
Hans Baldung's so-called Bewitched Groom is one of the most enigmatic and fascinating woodcuts of his time. Lacking the mythological allusions and dense symbolism of the most complex prints by Albrecht Dürer - Baldung's master between 1503-1507 - it presents the viewer with a clear, yet sophisticated composition. Seen slightly from above, a man lies flat on his back, his feet in the foreground. He seems to have fallen suddenly on the floor and dropped his tools, which identify him as a groom: a pitchfork and a currycomb. A few steps behind him, on the threshold to another room in the stable building, stands a powerful horse, seen from behind but with the head turned towards the groom and the viewer with glaring eyes and flared nostrils. To the right, between the figure of the horse and the groom, an old woman leans from the outside into the interior of the room. With her wizened face and bare, sagging breast she conforms with the stereotype of a 'hag' or witch. Above her head, she holds a torch, perhaps about to throw it and to set the room on fire.
A few art historical connections can be made: the iconography of Baldung's old woman goes back to depictions of the Three Fates, in particular Atropos, who cuts the thread of life, while the actual model for this figure may have been Mantegna's allegory of Envy (invidia) in Mantegna's engraving of the Battle of the Sea Gods (Bartsch 18). The figure of the groom was almost certainly also inspired by Mantegna and his painting of the Dead Christ (Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan), shown with extreme foreshortening from a very similar perspective. Dürer was certainly familiar with the works of Mantegna, and there can be very little doubt that his pupil Hans Baldung was too. Finally, it is worth noting that, with his sideburns and moustache, the groom resembles the artist in his later self-portraits, and that the coat-of-arms with the rampant unicorn is Baldung's own. The woodcut thus appears to be a self-portrait of sorts, yet the meaning of the event remains a mystery. Is the horse just a bystander, as the witch has cursed the groom? Has she put a spell on the horse, who in turn has felled the groom? Or is the ominously staring horse taking revenge on its master with the help of the witch? Are the two complicit in their attack on the man? Baldung left the scene frozen in time, in suspense between a past and a future we will never know. What is evident is that the artist took an unusual interest in witchcraft and created some of most influential depictions of witches and sorcery in Western art.
A few art historical connections can be made: the iconography of Baldung's old woman goes back to depictions of the Three Fates, in particular Atropos, who cuts the thread of life, while the actual model for this figure may have been Mantegna's allegory of Envy (invidia) in Mantegna's engraving of the Battle of the Sea Gods (Bartsch 18). The figure of the groom was almost certainly also inspired by Mantegna and his painting of the Dead Christ (Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan), shown with extreme foreshortening from a very similar perspective. Dürer was certainly familiar with the works of Mantegna, and there can be very little doubt that his pupil Hans Baldung was too. Finally, it is worth noting that, with his sideburns and moustache, the groom resembles the artist in his later self-portraits, and that the coat-of-arms with the rampant unicorn is Baldung's own. The woodcut thus appears to be a self-portrait of sorts, yet the meaning of the event remains a mystery. Is the horse just a bystander, as the witch has cursed the groom? Has she put a spell on the horse, who in turn has felled the groom? Or is the ominously staring horse taking revenge on its master with the help of the witch? Are the two complicit in their attack on the man? Baldung left the scene frozen in time, in suspense between a past and a future we will never know. What is evident is that the artist took an unusual interest in witchcraft and created some of most influential depictions of witches and sorcery in Western art.