The Mystic Marriage of St Catherine
Artist/Maker
Material / Technique
Dimensionsh x w: Mått 104 x 86 cm h x w x d: Ram 121 x 106 x 7 cm
Inventory numberNM 242
Other titlesTitle (sv): Sta Katarinas trolovning Title (en): The Mystic Marriage of St Catherine
DescriptionCatalogue raisonné: Description in Flemish paintings C. 1600-C. 1800 III, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2010, cat.no. 54: Technical notes: The support consists of a single piece of twill fabric with 13–14 weft threads and a 19 warp threads per square centimetre. Fragments of the tacking edges, which have been neither grounded nor painted, are preserved along all four edges. There is a selvage on the right tacking edge. Cusping exists along all four edges. The painting is in the original format but has been lined and mounted on a non-original stretcher. The canvas has been prepared with a brownish-red ground that has probably been applied evenly. The paint layer is opaque and impasto and covers the ground completely. There is cool grey underpainting under the flesh tones. Red sections of Mary’s gown have a dark-red glaze (which may be madder). The gown has been corrected in places with an overpainted blue veil. The details have been painted on a dry surface with lavish paint to attain physicality in the rendering of the textiles and the sewing basket in the foreground. The pane of glass in the background is modelled in white paint that has been applied thickly in circles which adds a relief effect to the glass. The palette consists predominantly of red and blue pigments mixed with white and there are traces of yellow, white and earth colours. The painting underwent conservation treatment in 1988. Provenance: Coll. P. W. Grubb; purchased 1857; KM 1861, no. 1042; NM Cat. 1866 no. 242 (as an anonymous Italian artist, latter half of 17th century). Bibliography: Sander IV, p. 154, no. 1042 (as anonymous master); Göthe 1887, p.119 (as anonymous Italian master, 16th century); Göthe 1893, p. 150 (as anonymous Italian master); NM Cat. 1958, p. 233 (as anonymous Italian master, late 17th century); NM Cat. 1990, p. 61, late 17th century. This painting with its religious motif has been ascribed by earlier scholars to an anonymous Italian artist but can now be linked on stylistic grounds to the oeuvre of Denys Calvaerts. Calvaert spent most of his career in Italy and his works testify to his roots in contemporary Italian art, particularly in Bologna during the late 16th and early 17th centuries. The attribution to Calvaert was initially proposed by Catherine Johnston in 1988 and she also related the motif to a number of drawings depicting the mystic marriage of St. Catherine to the Infant Jesus by Calvaert.1 Some of these drawings are in the Louvre’s collections2 and one was sold in 1977 by the Karl Faber auction house.3 There are stylistic resemblances between these drawings and the painting in the Nationalmuseum, which combine to strengthen the attribution to Calvaert. This applies in particular to the physical volume of the figures depicted, the plasticity, monumental expression and stylised folds in the garments. In connection with her proposed attribution, Johnston also cited his teacher Lorenzo Sabbatini, who was for some time a source of inspiration for Calvaert. The motif of the mystic marriage of St. Catherine with the Infant Jesus was a popular one in earlier art. Cranach, Dürer, Memling, J. Provost, G. de Crayer, Rubens, Corregio, Tintoretto and Calvaert are among the many celebrated artists who portrayed this religious motif.4 It can be seen in a signed painting by Calvaert from 1590 in the Pinacoteca Capitolina in Rome.5 This work, from 1590 is painted in accordance with the mannerist ideals, with its elongated portrayal of the figures and the artificiality of its palette.6 The Nationalmuseum’s painting depicts its subjects without distorting their proportions and with greater plas- ticity than the work referred to, which suggests that the Stockholm painting was made during another period of the artist’s production than the work in Rome. There are, however, similarities in the rendering of the facial expressions. According to her legend, St. Catherine of Alexandra was of royal descent and she is mainly known for two things, one being her attempt to convert the Emperor Maxentius, the other her marriage to the Infant Jesus. Her most frequent attributes are her wheel, often broken, a sword that is linked to her attempt to convert Maxentius as well as a ring which is connected to her mystic marriage with the Infant Jesus. In some images that depict the conversion scene, St. Catherine is portrayed with a crown on her head as she tramples the Emperor Maxentius beneath her feet. As punishment for her attempt to convert Maxentius the legend tells us that she was made to defend her faith in a disputation with fifty philosophers, who she is said to have converted. Catherine was forced, however, to cut four of these philosophers to ribbons with the aid of a wheel equipped with sharp spikes and knives, which accounts for the use of a partially broken wheel as her attribute. When Catherine was supposed to cut the four philosophers to ribbons the legend tells us that an angel appeared and destroyed the wheel. Catherine was then beheaded, in 306 or 307, and died a martyr’s death. In the narrative of the life of St. Catherine, scene no. 14 describes the marriage with the Infant Jesus.7 This motif is usually depicted with the Infant placing a ring on Catherine’s finger, as it is in the painting in the Nationalmuseum. As is customary, St. Catherine’s hair is down, she has a crown on her head, is carrying a palm leaf to symbolise her martyrdom and has a wheel at her side. The Infant Jesus is naked apart from a lightly draped veil. The Infant is seated in the lap of the Virgin Mary and concentrating on placing the ring on Catherine’s finger, while in the background John is portrayed with one hand against his chest to signify sincerity, faith and honesty and a winged angel watches from between Catherine and the Virgin. The main scene with St. Catherine, the Infant Jesus and the Virgin is depicted in the foreground in a scene delimited by a window to the left behind John and a view of a landscape to the right. Four figures are portrayed in the landscape, two of them in a garden surrounded by a fence and next to a stone building. Beyond a wall, a number of trees in leaf are depicted and the silhouette of a mountain. There is a degree of monumentality in the portrayal of the Virgin Mary in particular and her garments and their folds are rendered in a stylised manner. The motif as a whole is characterised by sincerity and its concentration on the Infant Jesus and the mystic marriage with the saint that finds expression in his placing of the ring on her finger. KS 1 See the letter from Catherine Johnston, Curator of European Art, National Gallery of Art, Canada, to Görel Cavalli-Björkman 6/9 1988, NM curatorial files. 2 La Sainte Famille et Sainte Catherine d’Alexandrie, Inv. no. 21 409, recto. 3 145, 26–28 May 1977, lot 56. 4 Lexikon der Christlichen Ikonograhie, 7, pp. 295–296. 5 Inv. no. 99, oil on toile, 94 x 70 cm, signed and dated “DIONISIO CAL…1590”. 6 For details about this painting see Fiamminghi a Roma 1508–1608, Artistes des Pays-Bas et de la Principaute de Liege a Rome a la Renaissance, Brussels, 1995, cat. no. 49, pp. 130–131. 7 Lexikon der Christlichen Ikonographie, 7, Rome 1974, p. 293.
Motif categoryReligion/Mythology
Collection
TechniquePainting
Object category
Keyword