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Lot Essay
The gentle hills surmounted by fortified castles, arranged over a succession of colored planes create a simple and almost abstract panoramic vista in the tradition of the most influential northern landscape painter of the 16th century, Joachim Patinir. In a letter dated 6 June 1979, Robert A Kock noted the connection to this seminal artist, and further specified that the highly-distinctive treatment of the figures of the Holy Family suggests that this was a collaborative work between two separate artists, with the figures painted by a follower of Pieter Coecke van Aelst (cited in the 1980 Christie’s sale catalogue). When the painting sold in 1999, the sale catalogue recorded the opinion of Walter Gibson, who suggested that it was a collaborative work between the young Lucas Gassel, who would have painted the landscape, and the Master of the Louvre Madonna, who would have painted the figures. At that time, Edwin Buijsen endorsed this attribution on the basis of photographs, while Reindert Falkenburg suggested this was an early work by Gassel, painted in Antwerp with the assistance of his workshop. More recently, the painting has been associated with Cornelis Massys.
The anonymous master known as the Master of the Louvre Madonna was given his sobriquet by Diane Wolfthal in 1989 (D. Wolfthal, Beginnings of Netherlandish Canvas Painting: 1400-1530, 1989, pp. 81-3). Wolfthal identified a group of eight canvases and three panels with strong compositional links to a tempera on linen painting in the Louvre, Paris (inv. no. RF.46). These pictures, all presumed to have issued from the same workshop, share certain common features: 'a half-length Madonna with lowered eyes, wavy hair cascading down the shoulders, and mantle opened to reveal the Child nursing at the left breast. Mary supports the Child with the left hand, which is in large part covered by the mantle. With his left arm, the Child grasps the breast. Below, a small part of the Virgin's right hand is visible' The Master was thought by Max J. Friedländer to be German in origin (see L. Cust, 'Franco-Flemish School: Divine Mother', Burlington Magazine, XI, 1907, p. 232). Lionel Cust, however, doubted this, and subsequent scholars have tended to agree with him, attributing the works variously to the School of Massys, School of Antwerp (with dates from 1490-circa 1520) and Netherlandish School, circa 1500, while the Louvre describes its version as Southern Netherlandish School, first half of the sixteenth century. The distinctive features of Mary and Joseph in the present painting fit well with this group.
The artist responsible for the landscape included in the background at left a vignette of soldiers talking to farmers as they harvest grain - a reference to the Miracle of the Wheat Field. This apocryphal story recounts that when the Holy Family passed a newly-sown field during the Flight into Egypt, the wheat miraculously grew to full height and was immediately ready to be harvested. Soon after, Roman soldiers interrogated the farmers, who truthfully answered that the family had passed them when they were sowing their fields. Understanding that this meant their quarry was several months ahead of them, the soldiers abandoned their chase.
The anonymous master known as the Master of the Louvre Madonna was given his sobriquet by Diane Wolfthal in 1989 (D. Wolfthal, Beginnings of Netherlandish Canvas Painting: 1400-1530, 1989, pp. 81-3). Wolfthal identified a group of eight canvases and three panels with strong compositional links to a tempera on linen painting in the Louvre, Paris (inv. no. RF.46). These pictures, all presumed to have issued from the same workshop, share certain common features: 'a half-length Madonna with lowered eyes, wavy hair cascading down the shoulders, and mantle opened to reveal the Child nursing at the left breast. Mary supports the Child with the left hand, which is in large part covered by the mantle. With his left arm, the Child grasps the breast. Below, a small part of the Virgin's right hand is visible' The Master was thought by Max J. Friedländer to be German in origin (see L. Cust, 'Franco-Flemish School: Divine Mother', Burlington Magazine, XI, 1907, p. 232). Lionel Cust, however, doubted this, and subsequent scholars have tended to agree with him, attributing the works variously to the School of Massys, School of Antwerp (with dates from 1490-circa 1520) and Netherlandish School, circa 1500, while the Louvre describes its version as Southern Netherlandish School, first half of the sixteenth century. The distinctive features of Mary and Joseph in the present painting fit well with this group.
The artist responsible for the landscape included in the background at left a vignette of soldiers talking to farmers as they harvest grain - a reference to the Miracle of the Wheat Field. This apocryphal story recounts that when the Holy Family passed a newly-sown field during the Flight into Egypt, the wheat miraculously grew to full height and was immediately ready to be harvested. Soon after, Roman soldiers interrogated the farmers, who truthfully answered that the family had passed them when they were sowing their fields. Understanding that this meant their quarry was several months ahead of them, the soldiers abandoned their chase.