Master of the Female Half-Lengths
(First Half of the 16th Century)

The Baptism of Christ and St. Ildefonso: A Pair of Altarpiece Wings

both oil on panel

30"×9 1/2" (75 cm×24 cm)

PROVENANCE:
Art Market, Paris with Jonas, 1938; E. & A. Silberman Galleries, Inc. New York, circa 1938; Oliver B. James sale, Parke-Bernet Galleries, Inc., New York, October 19, 1955, lot 17, (St. lldefonso sold singly and here entitled St. Anselm of Canterbury) where bought by Dr. Norman Treves; Anonymous sale, Parke-Bernet Galleries, Inc., New York, April 23, 1958, lot 3, (St. Ildefonso sold singly and here entitled St. Anselm of Canterbury); E. & A. Silberman Galleries, Inc., New York (wings are reunited), where acquired by Private Collection, circa 1959 until the present time

Exhibited

Baltimore, Maryland, The Baltimore Museum of Art, Religious Art, December 4, 1938 — January 1, 1939, no. 5, both exhibited, St. lldefonso here entitled St. Anselm of Canterbury, (lent by E. & A. Silberman Galleries) West Palm Beach, Florida, The Norton Gallery and School of Art, Paintings of the Renaissance, January 30 — February 22, 1948, no. 19 & 20, both exhibited, St. Ildefonso here entitled St. Anselm of Canterbury, (lent by E. & A. Silberman Galleries) Columbus, Ohio, Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, The Gothic North, October 1 — November 7, 1949, no. 18, both exhibited, St. lldefonso here entitled St. Anselm of Canterbury, (lent by E. & A. Silberman Galleries) Hagerstown, Maryland, Washington County Museum of Fine Arts, The Life of Christ, February 18 — March 31, 1951, no. 3, illustrated, The Baptism of Christ exhibited solely, (lent by E. & A. Silberman Galleries) New Orleans, Louisiana, Isaac Delgado Museum of Art, 1962, both exhibited, St. lldefonso here entitled The Apparition of the Virgin to St. Benedict.

Literature

Max J. Friedländer, Die Altniederländische Malerei, volume XII, 1935, p. 171, no.(5) 4 Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, catalogue of exhibition, The Gothic North in Annual Report, Fall Bulletin, 1949, volume 20, no. 1, p. 4, no. 18 Max J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish Painting, Jan van Scorel and Pieter Coeck van Aelst, volume XII, New York, 1975, p. 96, plate 33, no. 54, illustrated (as present location unknown)

The Master of the Female Half-Lengths is the name given to what is now believed to have been an atelier of artists working together as opposed to an individual master. Responsible for more than one hundred surviving works, scant factual knowledge about the group exists. Their title derives from a series of half-length views of elegant young women in interiors engaged in writing, reading or the making of music. Other specialties of the workshop were religious subjects such as The Holy Family or The Madonna and Child. The majority of their output seems to stem from the 1520’s and 1530’s. The location of the workshop has been debated, Ghent, Mechelen, the French court, as well as Antwerp or Bruges are suggested possibilities. Unifying traits displayed by the groups’ distinctive figures include: longish somewhat flattened faces with straight thin noses, downcast eyes, and big narrow eyebrows placed on elegant slender bodies with restrained gestures, conceived by facile strokes culminating in enamel-like surfaces.(1)

Adaptations from Jan Gossaert (1478 — 1533), Ambrosius Benson (d. 1550), Barent van Orley (c. 1492 — 1542), Pieter Coecke van Aelst (1502 — 1550), Adriaen Isenbrandt (1490 — 1551), Joachim Patinir (1485 — 1524) i.e. our landscape of The Baptism of Christ, and even Rogier van der Weyden (1399 — 1464) are evident. This diverse, extensive, and eclectic borrowing of models and motifs can be viewed as reflective of the period as well as a compliance with contemporary taste.(2) The most popular subjects of the period came from the Life of the Virgin, and The Infancy and Passion of Christ, as well as the lives of the Saints.(3) The Master of the Female Half-Lengths workshop mixed divergent popular designs to repeatedly produce charming and colorful imagery directed at an audience that sought the reassurance of the familiar.(4)

Depictions of The Baptism of Christ can be found as early as the third century. Christ is shown standing ankle-deep in the river Jordan. John the Baptist is beside him on the riverbank pouring water over his head from a cupped hand. Above the scene is the Dove of the Holy Spirit and higher the Figure of God the Father making the sign of the blessing with his right hand and holding a globe with his left. In the middle ground of the panel the earlier occurrence of John the Baptist Preaching to the Multitude takes place. The background culminates in a fantasy of blue mountain peaks.

Although erroneously catalogued and sold over the years as a depiction of St. Anselm of Canterbury or The Apparition of the Virgin to St. Benedict our panel represents St. Ildefonso Receiving the Chasuble from the Virgin. Ildefonso was born in Toledo, Spain in 607 and died there in 667. He was the nephew of St. Eugene of Toledo. He was ordained about 637, made Abbot of Toledo circa 650, and succeeded his uncle as Archbishop of Toledo around 657. Devoted to the Virgin he wrote a treatise in defense of her perpetual virginity entitled De Virginitate Perpetua Sanctae Mariae. Our panel depicts the vision Ildefonso had while praying in his cathedral in Toledo in which the Virgin descended from heaven and presented him with a chasuble. He is believed to be responsible for the unification of the Spanish liturgy and is venerated throughout Spain, especially in Toledo and Seville.(5) Although the depiction of St. Ildefonso by this workshop might appear incongruous, quite a number of their works were produced for export and many sent to Spain.(6)

(1) Ellen Konowitz, "The Master of the Female Half-Lengths Group, Eclecticism, and Novelty," Oud Holland, volume 113, pp. 1-4, 7, 9.

(2) Ibid, pp. 1, 4-7, 10.

(3) Annik Born, "Antwerp Mannerism: A Fashionable Style?", exhibition catalogue Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp, Extravagant! A Forgotten Chapter of Antwerp Painting 1500- 1530, October 15 — December 31, 2005 & traveling, p. 13.

(4) Konowitz, pp. 1, 6-7, 9-10.

(5) The Benedictine Monks of St. Augustine’s Abbey (compilers), Ramsgate, The Book of Saints, A & C. Block, Ltd., London, 1931, p. 141.

(6) Ellen Konowitz, Master of the Female Half-Lengths, catalogue Salomon Lillian, Amsterdam, 2004, p. 50.

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