Ambrosius Benson, um 1495 Lombardei – 1550 Brügge CONFESSION... Lot 213

Ambrosius Benson, um 1495 Lombardei – 1550 Brügge CONFESSION OF CHRIST BEFORE FURTHER LANDSCAPE Oil on wood. Parquetry. 120 x 94.5 cm. In ebonized wide frame with gold inner border. Enclosed in copy an expert opinion by Max Friedländer, Berlin, November 16, 1929, who recognized the present painting as a characteristic work by Ambrosius Benson. Enclosed in copy an exchange of correspondence between Dr. Richard Doetsch-Benziger, Brussels, 5 November 1955, confirming the attribution to Benson. Illustrated in the RKD Image Archive under the number: 0000029931. A "characteristic work by Amrosius Benson" (Max Friedländer), a "magnifique pietà en diagonale-tableaux d'histoire" (Georges Marlier), has been entrusted to us for auction. The painting has a rich provenance and exhibition history and has been mentioned many times in the literature over the last 120 years. With the present painting we are still very close to Ambrosius Benson's teacher: Gerard David (c. 1460-1523) by whom we know, for instance, a Lamentation of Christ, executed in landscape format and preserved in the Art Institute of Chicago (Inv.No. 33.1040). Another Pietà from David's hand is kept in the National Gallery in London, but already shows a vertical orientation of Christ's body. Benson also varied vertical and horizontal formats in the representation of his Lamentations of Christ. Thus, in addition to the painting offered here, there is also a landscape-format representation, which admittedly remains limited in its narrative details due to its spatial restriction with the same presence of the person. Thus in the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco under Inv.No. 1956.90 a Lamentation is kept which remains limited to five instead of our seven figures and owes its verticals to Golgata's stumps of the cross which here have been replaced by loosely juxtaposed architectures of Jerusalem. The solution of the cross as a traditional motif rather than the view of the Heavenly Jerusalem seems to have been Benson's preferred motif for the Pietà in the vertical format anyway; thus a Lamentation bounded on the sides by curtains is also preserved in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, in which the cross motifs are given preference. There is, however, an example with the architectural and hilly background, which is a variant of our painting and - also as Ambrosius Benson - is registered at the RKD in The Hague (no. 62619) (see comparative fig.). The portrait-format painting shows the diagonally erect figure of Christ with his stigmata and emaciated body. In front of him are cloths and ointment vessels, his hand rests in the hand of his mother, who is caught behind by John the Baptist. His other companions form a compositional unity, silhouetted by the landscape behind, introduced by a rock as a repoussoir on the right. The rock also provides space for the sarcophagus prepared for Christ's body, which can also be seen as an architectural element in direct comparison to Jerusalem in the background. Provenance: Probably royal collection, Spain. Collection Sir John Watkins Brett. Private collection of Professor How, on loan to London in 1906: Exhibition of works by Flemish and modern Belgian painters, Guildhall Art Gallery, London, 3 May 1906 - 28 July 1906. Christie's auction, London, 13 July 1923, lot 72. Arthur Tooth & Sons, London. Sackville Gallery, London, November 1928. Helbing auction, Düsseldorf, "Gemälde(...) aus Rheinischem, Berliner und Ausländischem Museums- und Privatbesitz", 11 March 1933, lot 3 (with black and white illustration) with appraisal by Friedländer. Hugo Perls, Berlin. Collection Richard Doelsch-Benziger, Basel. Galerie Libertas, Bruges. Literature: Alfred George Temple, Catalogue of the Exhibition of works by Flemish and modern Belgian painters, Guildhall Art Gallery, London, 3 May 1906 - 28 July 1906, London 1906, p. 58, no. 59A. Annales de la Société d'Emulation de Bruges, vol. LVIII, Bruges 1908. Georges Marlier, Ambrosius Benson et la peinture à Bruges au temps de Charles-Quint, Damme 1957, pp. 161-163, 293, no. 43, ill. plate 39. Max J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish painting, vol. XI, Brussels 1974, no. 252, plate 168. The present painting is classified at the RKD under no. 62614 as an autograph work by Ambrosius Benson. Exhibitions: Exhibition of works by Flemish and modern Belgian painters, Guildhall Art Gallery, London, 3 May 1906 - 28 July 1906. Van Memling tot Pourbus, 1998, no. 61, p. 92. (1290863) (1) (13) Ambrosius Benson, c. 1495 Lombardy - 1550 Bruges THE LAMENTATION OF CHRIST IN VAST LANDSCAPE Oil on panel. Parquetted. 120 x 94.5 cm. <br /