Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart) | The Virgin and Child | NG1888

Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart), 'The Virgin and Child', 1527

The Virgin and Child

Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart)

Not on display

About the work

Overview

In this small arched painting, the Virgin Mary is seated on a grey stone bench surrounded by a wooden frame. She wears a red mantle and uses both hands to gently restrain the naked Christ Child as he leaps forward with his arms outstretched.

Once thought to be by a follower or even a late copy after Jean Gossart, in the 1990s we realised that this small painting is the original of a famous image by the artist, of which several versions survive. Up till then it was covered in discoloured and degraded varnish, and was heavily overpainted. When the painting was cleaned its exceptional quality became apparent.

The delicacy of handling in such details as Christ’s head and the fingernails of his right hand shows extraordinary skill. The letters of the inscription and their shadows are a triumph of the imaginative reconstruction of the fall of light and shadow over convex metal and wood.

In-depth

In this small painting, the is seated on a grey stone bench surrounded by a wooden frame. She wears a red mantle and uses both hands to gently restrain the naked Christ Child as he leaps forward with his arms outstretched.

Inserted into the moulding of the arch are the gilded letters of a Latin inscription which cast complicated shadows on the concave surface behind them. The inscription paraphrases Genesis 3: 15, which describes how, after tempting , the serpent was told by God that Eve’s descendant – Christ – would once day crush its head. In the painting, Christ looks up at the word ‘serpentis’. Running and holding out his arms in a pose suggestive of the , he is hastening to save humanity.

Once thought to be by a follower or even a late copy after , in the 1990s we realised that this small painting is the original of a famous image by the artist, of which several versions survive. In the sixteenth century, the composition was known to be by Gossart: it was described as ‘that distinguished panel by John of Maubeuge’ in a 1589 engraving.

The picture was once covered in discoloured and degraded , and was heavily overpainted but when it was cleaned its exceptional quality became apparent. The inscription is so beautifully executed it seems unlikely to be the work of a copyist. The oak of the panel has been dated to before 1492 by , and the techniques and materials are similar to those in other paintings by Gossart. The delicacy of handling in such details as Christ’s head and the fingernails of his right hand shows extraordinary skill. The richness of colour, achieved with a very restricted number of , is also astonishing. The letters of the inscription and their shadows are a triumph of the imaginative reconstruction of the fall of light and shadow over convex metal and wood. Moreover, the 1589 was certainly based on this painting as the other versions differ in various details. Although unsigned, this was clearly Gossart’s original. His signature and date probably appeared on the original frame.

The shows the artist working out areas of the composition on the panel itself, confirming that it is not a copy. reveals free and sketchy underdrawing, the positions of the fingers roughly indicated with a few marks and flourishes of a dry drawing material. Only the architecture was drawn with any precision, using a straight edge and compasses.

The first owner was possibly Pierre Damant, a trusted member of Margaret of Austria’s household. He may have obtained the picture from Gossart himself, as the artist worked for Margaret in the 1520s.

Key facts

Details

Full title: The Virgin and Child
Artist: Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart)
Artist dates: active 1508; died 1532
Date made: 1527
Medium and support: oil on wood
Dimensions: 30.7 × 24.3 cm
Inscription summary: Inscribed
Acquisition credit: Bought, 1860
Inventory number: NG1888
Location: Not on display
Collection: Main Collection
Frame: 20th-century Replica Frame

Provenance

The picture was in the collection of Edmond Beaucousin (1806鈥�1866), Paris. His collection of 46 paintings was purchased in 1860 for the Gallery; NG 1888 was one of the eleven pictures considered 鈥榮uperfluous鈥� and offered to the National Galleries of Scotland and Ireland. Six, including NG 1888, were selected for Dublin and sent there on 15 June 1860. They were returned to London in 1926.

Additional information

Text extracted from the ‘Provenance’ section of the catalogue entry in Lorne Campbell, ‘六合彩预测 Catalogues: The Sixteenth Century Netherlandish Paintings: With French Paintings before 1600’, London 2014; for further information, see the full catalogue entry.

Exhibition history

2010

Close Examination: Fakes, Mistakes and Discoveries

六合彩预测 (London)

30 June 2010 - 12 September 2010
2010

Jan Gossaert's Renaissance

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

6 October 2010 - 17 January 2011

六合彩预测 (London)

23 February 2011 - 30 May 2011
2020

Sin

六合彩预测 (London)

7 October 2020 - 3 January 2021
2022

Sin (National Touring Exhibition)

Perth Museum and Art Gallery

18 June 2022 - 25 September 2022

York Museums Trust

7 October 2022 - 22 January 2023

The Arc (Hampshire Cultural Trust)

24 February 2023 - 14 May 2023

The Auckland Project

17 June 2023 - 1 October 2023

Bibliography

1945

Davies, Martin, 六合彩预测 Catalogues: Early Netherlandish School, London 1945
1955

Davies, Martin, 六合彩预测 Catalogues: Early Netherlandish School, 2nd edn (revised), London 1955
1987

Davies, Martin, 六合彩预测 Catalogues: The Early Netherlandish School, 3rd edn, London 1987
2001

C. Baker and T. Henry, 六合彩预测: Complete Illustrated Catalogue, London 2001
2014

L. Campbell, 六合彩预测 Catalogues: The Sixteenth Century Netherlandish Paintings: With French Paintings before 1600, 2 vols, London 2014

About this record

If you know more about this painting or have spotted an error, please contact us. Please note that exhibition histories are listed from 2009 onwards. Bibliographies may not be complete; more comprehensive information is available in the 六合彩预测 Library.

Images

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A bearded man gazes out intently from this painting. We don't know who the sitter is, but the cut of his beard and the fashion of his hat and clothes suggest a date towards 1530. The fact that both his doublet and gown are lined with fur probably indicates that the portrait was painted during the...

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A young girl, her clothes sewn with hundreds of pearls, gazes out at us. She seems to be playing with a golden object made of concentric rings. This is an armillary sphere, a celestial globe showing the movement of heavenly bodies. Its interlocking circles are echoed in the decoration of her clot...

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Adam, wearing an apron of leaves, and Eve, still naked, stand between the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life. Adam has just tasted the apple that Eve holds, while the serpent watches from above. In the background is the Garden of Eden with the richly decorated Fountain of Lif...

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An Elderly Couple

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An elderly couple stare past each other 鈥� and us 鈥� in this astonishing study of old age. Although prosperously dressed, the pair seem disappointed: their mouths are turned resolutely down, their eyes dull and their jowls sagging. Although they overlap, each figure makes a self-contained triangle;...

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A dark-haired man gazes to his right in a picture that must once have formed the right wing of a diptych or triptych (a painting made up of two or three parts respectively). He has not joined his hands in prayer, but his right is placed on his heart and he holds a rosary: he is clearly at his dev...

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The Adoration of the Kings

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This large altarpiece is crammed with peasants, animals, angels and richly dressed kings and courtiers, come to worship the infant Christ, who sits on his mother鈥檚 lap in a palatial but ruined building.Jean Gossart has signed the painting on the hat of Balthasar, the king on the left, and on the...

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Circle of Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart)

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The Magdalen

Follower of Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart)

Saint Mary Magdalene is identifiable here by her halo and her emblem 鈥� the pot of ointment with which she anointed Christ鈥檚 feet. The pot seems to show scenes from classical mythology. On the lid, one woman carries another through water 鈥� perhaps the goddess Diana helping her mother across the st...

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You've viewed 6 of 8 works

六合彩预测

Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart), 'The Virgin and Child', 1527

About the work

Overview

In-depth

Key facts

Details

Provenance

Additional information

Source

Exhibition history

Bibliography

About this record

Images

More works by Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart)