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Lot Essay
Full of movement and vibrant colors, Hans Baldung Grien’s Virgin and Child in a chamber is a poignant study of the intimate relationship between Mary and Jesus. An angel draws aside the curtain of a red tent to reveal Mary, kneeling on a stone floor. She embraces her son, pressing her cheek to his as she looks down sorrowfully toward a large, open book. A second angel turns its pages as the Holy Spirit descends from above in the form of a dove within a golden halo of light. A third angel peeks from beneath the back of the tent, drawing the viewer into the picture with his gaze. In the mid-twentieth century, Carl Koch linked the iconography of this composition to the Revelations of St. Bridget of Sweden, which enjoyed immense popularity at the time Baldung painted this panel (C. Koch, 'Baldungs klassische Periode', in Kunstgeschichtliche Gesellschaft Berlin, Sitzungsberichte, January 1952-May 1953, pp. 22ff.). First printed in Lübeck in 1492, her writings were translated into German and published a decade later in Augsburg. Book I, chapter X, relates how soon after the Nativity, Mary gazed upon her son and became overwhelmed by the great heartache that came with her foreknowledge of his crucifixion: 'When I gazed upon and contemplated his beauty, joy seeped through my soul like dewdrops and I knew myself to be unworthy of such a son. But when I considered the places where (as I had learned from the predictions of the prophets) nails would be pierced through his hands and feet at the crucifixion, my eyes filled with tears and my heart was almost torn apart by sorrow.' For St. Bridget, the Virgin was the saddest of all mothers because the Holy Spirit enabled her to understand the writings of the prophets more perfectly than the prophets were able to themselves, and thereby knew what her son’s fate would be. Gert von der Osten notes that Baldung’s unusual choice to situate this dramatic moment beneath a red tent was likely inspired by early liturgical color prints of Christmas, Passion Week and the Pentecost (loc. cit.). The three balls at upper right are likely an allusion to the Rosary, while the stairs might be included to indicate that the scene takes place before the case in which, following the writings of St. Bridget, the Nativity occurred (ibid.).
Another version of this composition, in rather poor condition, is in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg. Paul Wescher (op. cit., no. 33) suggested that the Nuremberg painting originally belonged to the Markgräfler Hof in Basel, though as von der Osten notes, without further documentation, this theory remains unprovable (op. cit., p. 132). A related pen and ink drawing with white heightening on brown-tinted paper is in the Kupferstichkabinett of the Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart.
Though upon its discovery in the late nineteenth century, the present version was dismissed by Robert Stiassny (1887) and Ludwig Scheibler (1887) as not by Baldung. In 1912, Gábor Térey argued that it was a better-preserved, superior version of the Nuremberg picture. In the mid-twentieth century, Carl Koch (1953) similarly recognized it as an autograph replica, though the attribution was again doubted in the 1959 Baldung exhibition. Burton Frederickson (before 1976) considered it to be the earlier of the two. Hans Curjel (1923), Helmut Perseke (1941) and Walter Hugelshofer (1969) viewed them as contemporary to one another. In his catalogue raisonné (1983), von der Osten wrote that he did not doubt Baldung’s artistic responsibility for the present version, which he presumed was painted subsequently to the Nuremberg panel. Concluding that it was painted in Freiburg or Strasbourg in 1516 or shortly thereafter, he proposed that it should be catalogued as Hans Baldung and Workshop. Working from photographs, Bodo Brinkman, to whom we are grateful, considers von der Osten’s opinion very plausible and valid (private communication, 13 September 2022), noting that the softer, more painterly handling of the Nuremberg painting relative to the strong black contours and crisper execution of the present painting, suggest two different hands within the Baldung workshop, each guided by the master.
Another version of this composition, in rather poor condition, is in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg. Paul Wescher (op. cit., no. 33) suggested that the Nuremberg painting originally belonged to the Markgräfler Hof in Basel, though as von der Osten notes, without further documentation, this theory remains unprovable (op. cit., p. 132). A related pen and ink drawing with white heightening on brown-tinted paper is in the Kupferstichkabinett of the Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart.
Though upon its discovery in the late nineteenth century, the present version was dismissed by Robert Stiassny (1887) and Ludwig Scheibler (1887) as not by Baldung. In 1912, Gábor Térey argued that it was a better-preserved, superior version of the Nuremberg picture. In the mid-twentieth century, Carl Koch (1953) similarly recognized it as an autograph replica, though the attribution was again doubted in the 1959 Baldung exhibition. Burton Frederickson (before 1976) considered it to be the earlier of the two. Hans Curjel (1923), Helmut Perseke (1941) and Walter Hugelshofer (1969) viewed them as contemporary to one another. In his catalogue raisonné (1983), von der Osten wrote that he did not doubt Baldung’s artistic responsibility for the present version, which he presumed was painted subsequently to the Nuremberg panel. Concluding that it was painted in Freiburg or Strasbourg in 1516 or shortly thereafter, he proposed that it should be catalogued as Hans Baldung and Workshop. Working from photographs, Bodo Brinkman, to whom we are grateful, considers von der Osten’s opinion very plausible and valid (private communication, 13 September 2022), noting that the softer, more painterly handling of the Nuremberg painting relative to the strong black contours and crisper execution of the present painting, suggest two different hands within the Baldung workshop, each guided by the master.