Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-1
Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-2
Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-3
Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-4
Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-1Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-2Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-3Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary - image-4

Lot 2015 Dα

Master of the Prodigal Son Pieter Aertsen - Mount Calvary

Auction 1097 - overview Cologne
18.11.2017, 11:00 - Old Master Paintings, Drawings, and Sculpture
Estimate: 100.000 € - 130.000 €
Result: 136.400 € (incl. premium)

Master of the Prodigal Son
Pieter Aertsen

Mount Calvary

Oil on panel. 65 x 182 cm.

The present work, depicting the crucifixion on Mount Calvary in a distinctive horizontal composition with numerous detailed groups of main and supporting figures, is of interest for several reasons. Firstly, because it is a collaborative effort between two of the most important Netherlandish painters of the 16th century, and secondly, because a link can be established between this work and a carved wooden altarpiece in the Southern Netherlands.
The two painters in question are Pieter Aertsen and the so-called Master of the Prodigal Son, who was the elder of the two. Paul Verbraeken, Wouter Kloek, and Peter van den Brink have all researched this previously unpublished panel. All three agree, more or less, on the attribution to these artists. An infrared photograph of the panel has confirmed what all three experts recognised with the naked eye: The detailed underdrawing also displays the hands of two different artists.
The questions as to when and for what purpose the panel was painted have not yet been answered definitively. Karel van Mander (op. cit.) mentions that Pieter Aertsen lived in Boussy circa 1526/1527 when he was around 16 or 17 years old. This town houses a carved altarpiece with scenes from the Life of the Virgin, which lacks the crucifixion scene that would have completed the iconography. The width of the present panel corresponds exactly to that of the missing part of the altarpiece, therefore it is plausible to conceive that this work could be the missing predella to the altarpiece in Boussy. The back of the sturdy and well preserved panel bears a carpenter's mark to the reverse. The unpainted border of the work, clearly displaying the underdrawing, is also a unique detail.
The carved altarpiece can be dated to the 1520s on stylistic grounds. Pieter Aertsen would have been travelling as a journeyman in the Netherlands at around age 18, and could have been a fully qualified painter by the age of 25. He was accepted by the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1534. From that point on we have more information on his career and artistic style, but very little is known about what went before. If the present work really is an example of the artist's early œuvre, painted in Boussy together with an artist from the circle of the Master of the Prodigal Son, this cooperative effort would represent the earliest evidence we have of this artist. Most of his known works consist of market and kitchen still lifes, as many of his altarpieces were destroyed during the iconoclasm of 1566. The artist did not have a workshop of his own at that point, and would have worked in that of the Master of the Prodigal Son.

Certificate

Paul Verbraeken, 2013. - Wouter Kloek, 2013. - Peter van den Brink 2013.

Provenance

Galerie Benoit Tercelin de Joigny, Mons. - Private ownership, Antwerp.

Literature

C. van Mander: Het Schilder-Boek. Het Leven van Pieter Aertsen.Ausgabe 1950, p. 117.