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Lot Essay
This panel is typically grouped with a further four that were auctioned with it at the Molinari sale of 1885: Saint Michael (whereabouts unknown); Saint Dominic in his Study (Turin, Galleria Sabauda, inv. no. 1133); Saint Vincent Ferrer Preaching (Paris, Musée de Cluny); and The Nativity (Antwerp, Museum Mayer van den Bergh, inv. no. 127). The size, style and pattern of gilding and pastiglia in each bear strong similarities and establish a convincing connection between the pictures. Together, they would have formed an impressive retable, probably dedicated to Saint Dominic and Saint Vincent Ferrer, an influential Dominican preacher from Valencia whose cult was devoutly followed after his canonisation in 1455. The choice of saints thus suggests that the altarpiece was originally designed for a Dominican church and it is tempting to suggest that the donatrix in the present work is a nun of the Order. Her dress, however, is not comparable with Dominican habits and it may be more reasonable to suggest that she was instead a wealthy lay woman, almost certainly a widow, who would have financed and commissioned the altarpiece for the friars. The original appearance of the retable cannot be fully reconstructed but the size and shape of the surviving panels, and the examples of more complete retables by de Lonhy in Barcelona and Novalesa, suggest that it would have been a large, fixed altarpiece with the figures combining the artist’s knowledge of French and Netherlandish models, along with his observations of contemporary painting in Northern Italy. The face of his Saint John the Baptist, for example, is remarkably similar to that of the same saint in the Piedmontese painter Martino Spanzotti’s Four Saints in the Institute Rosmini, Stresa.
Antoine de Lonhy’s career is one of remarkable breadth and diversity. Until the publications of Romano and Avril, the artist was known only as the Master of The Trinity of Turin (named after a large panel of the Holy Trinity now in the Museo Civico de Arte Antica, Turin), or as the Master of the Saluce Hours. His identification as de Lonhy, however, and further investigation into the painter’s life, has provided a rough chronology of his fascinating career. The earliest reference to the painter is found in a contract, dated 8 October 1446, for the glass-maker ‘Euvrard Rubert’ and painter ‘Anthoine de Loigney’, to undertake the creation of the stained-glass windows at the Authume chateau of Nicolas Rolin (P. Lorentz, ‘Une commande du chacelier Nicolas Rolin au peintre Antoine de Lonhy (1446): la vitrerie du château a’Authumes’, Bulletin de la Société de l’Histoire de l’Art français, 1994, p. 10). As chancellor to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, Rolin was one of the most important political figures of his day. He was also a significant patron of the arts, commissioning his portrait before the Virgin and Child in circa 1435 from the ducal court painter Jan van Eyck (Paris, Musée du Louvre) as well as the famed Last Judgement Polyptych for the Hospice de Beaune from Rogier van der Weyden in 1443. De Lonhy can thus be placed, even at an early period in his career, within a circle of discerning patrons who evidently regarded him as a talented artist.
As was often the case with painters in the Southern Netherlands, de Lonhy is documented working across a number of different media, as a panel painter, illuminator, fresco painter and glass painter. This was not unusual. Van Eyck, for example, is thought to have worked as a manuscript illuminator during his early career and is documented polychroming sculpture for the Burgundian Court and civic authorities in Bruges. Two years after his commission from Rolin, de Lonhy illuminated a Presentation miniature of Jean Germain, Bishop of Chalon-sur-Saône, presenting his Mappemonde spirituelle to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (Lyon, Bibliothèque municipale, P.A. 32, f. 1), again demonstrating his esteemed position as an artist in the Burgundian Netherlands. The painter appears to have remained in France and Burgundy until the late 1450s, probably visiting Avignon where he may have been exposed to the work of the great French painter Enguerrard Quarton whose Coronation of the Virgin appears to have influenced de Lonhy’s later work. By 13 June 1460, he signed the contract to paint the decoration on the stained glass of the new rose-window of the Cathedral de Santa Maria del Mar in Barcelona. He continued to work in the city, painting a large retable, dated to circa 1460-1462, dedicated to Saint Nicholas of Tolentino and Saint Augustine (now split between the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, Barcelona and the Museu del Castell, Peralada). During these years, the painter was also active in Toulouse, where he is recorded as resident on the Rue La Porterie. In 1466, de Lonhy was working for Duke Amadeus IX of Savoy (1435-1472) at Chambéry. He remained in the duchy working for the court until at least the 1480s, painting several retables, including one for the parish church of Novalesa, and some frescoes, which included a portrait of Amadeus IX, at the Chiesa di San Domenico in Turin, a city the under Savoyard control.
Antoine de Lonhy’s career is one of remarkable breadth and diversity. Until the publications of Romano and Avril, the artist was known only as the Master of The Trinity of Turin (named after a large panel of the Holy Trinity now in the Museo Civico de Arte Antica, Turin), or as the Master of the Saluce Hours. His identification as de Lonhy, however, and further investigation into the painter’s life, has provided a rough chronology of his fascinating career. The earliest reference to the painter is found in a contract, dated 8 October 1446, for the glass-maker ‘Euvrard Rubert’ and painter ‘Anthoine de Loigney’, to undertake the creation of the stained-glass windows at the Authume chateau of Nicolas Rolin (P. Lorentz, ‘Une commande du chacelier Nicolas Rolin au peintre Antoine de Lonhy (1446): la vitrerie du château a’Authumes’, Bulletin de la Société de l’Histoire de l’Art français, 1994, p. 10). As chancellor to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, Rolin was one of the most important political figures of his day. He was also a significant patron of the arts, commissioning his portrait before the Virgin and Child in circa 1435 from the ducal court painter Jan van Eyck (Paris, Musée du Louvre) as well as the famed Last Judgement Polyptych for the Hospice de Beaune from Rogier van der Weyden in 1443. De Lonhy can thus be placed, even at an early period in his career, within a circle of discerning patrons who evidently regarded him as a talented artist.
As was often the case with painters in the Southern Netherlands, de Lonhy is documented working across a number of different media, as a panel painter, illuminator, fresco painter and glass painter. This was not unusual. Van Eyck, for example, is thought to have worked as a manuscript illuminator during his early career and is documented polychroming sculpture for the Burgundian Court and civic authorities in Bruges. Two years after his commission from Rolin, de Lonhy illuminated a Presentation miniature of Jean Germain, Bishop of Chalon-sur-Saône, presenting his Mappemonde spirituelle to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy (Lyon, Bibliothèque municipale, P.A. 32, f. 1), again demonstrating his esteemed position as an artist in the Burgundian Netherlands. The painter appears to have remained in France and Burgundy until the late 1450s, probably visiting Avignon where he may have been exposed to the work of the great French painter Enguerrard Quarton whose Coronation of the Virgin appears to have influenced de Lonhy’s later work. By 13 June 1460, he signed the contract to paint the decoration on the stained glass of the new rose-window of the Cathedral de Santa Maria del Mar in Barcelona. He continued to work in the city, painting a large retable, dated to circa 1460-1462, dedicated to Saint Nicholas of Tolentino and Saint Augustine (now split between the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, Barcelona and the Museu del Castell, Peralada). During these years, the painter was also active in Toulouse, where he is recorded as resident on the Rue La Porterie. In 1466, de Lonhy was working for Duke Amadeus IX of Savoy (1435-1472) at Chambéry. He remained in the duchy working for the court until at least the 1480s, painting several retables, including one for the parish church of Novalesa, and some frescoes, which included a portrait of Amadeus IX, at the Chiesa di San Domenico in Turin, a city the under Savoyard control.