The Adoration of the Magi
Artist/Maker
DatesSigned: Sign. 1618
Material / Technique
Dimensionsh x w: Mått 124 x 93 cm h x w x d: Ram 150 x 117 x 10 cm
Inventory numberNM 488
AcqusitionTransferred 1866 from Kongl. Museum
Other titlesTitle (sv): Herdarnas tillbedjan Title (en): The Adoration of the Magi Previous: The Adoration of the Shepherds
DescriptionCatalogue raisonné: Description in Flemish paintings C. 1600-C. 1800 III, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2010, cat.no. 103: Technical notes: The painting’s support is an oak panel (± 0.4–0.6 cm thick) constructed of three vertical, butt-joined, radial boards of approximately equal width with a vertical grain. Bevelling occurs along the top and, partially, the bottom edges. The dimensions are approximately those of the nearly identical autograph version of the composition at The Hague (Mauritshuis, inv. no. 937, oil on oak, 125.0 x 95.7 cm). The panel has been thinned and a cradle attached to the verso. All four corners are slightly damaged on the recto. Two vertical cracks in the support extending from the top edge, respectively 18 cm and 9 cm long, have been repaired and reinforced on the verso with pieces of wood. Dendrochronological examination and analysis have determined a felling date for the tree between c. 1611 and 1621. The wood originates from the Baltic region. The panel was prepared with a lower thick, smooth, white ground layer containing mostly chalk, applied with a broad bristle brush, which completely hides the wood grain of the support. This was covered by a very thin, semi-transparent, “streaky” light grey imprimatura, visible under the microscope only in those areas of the faces of Mary and the Child that are in shadow. Infrared reflectography partially revealed an extensive dark underdrawing in a dry medium, probably black chalk, visible as fine contour lines in the faces, bodies and draperies of the figures (in the face and straw hat of the woman on the left; the face, strands of hair, hands and right elbow of the shepherd on the left; the Virgin’s face; the Child’s face and the folds of his swaddling cloth; Joseph’s face; and the hair of the shepherd on the right). Multiple drawn lines were used in the Child’s swaddling cloth to indicate shading in the deepest folds. Although several of the heads (those of Joseph, the two shepherds, the two shepherdesses) were repeated identically in related Adoration scenes by Jordaens (see below), including the version at The Hague, no direct evidence of mechanical transfer could be detected. Paint was applied thickly and fluidly in mostly opaque and semi-transparent layers, with vigorous brushwork and rich impastos, which are built up almost in relief on the surface, in the whites (the Christ Child’s swaddling cloth, the old shepherdess’ headdress), the white and yellow lights (on the brass jug, the straw hat of the shepherdess on the left, the straw roof of the shed) and highlighted areas of faces and bodies, especially the pinkish white flesh tones of the Virgin and Christ Child. Ridges of excess paint not absorbed by the ground layers are visible along the contours of heads and hands. The warm orange-red robe of the shepherd on the left was shaded with a translucent dark red glaze. The pink of the Virgin’s robe, shaded in grey, was applied over a grey underpaint. The white strands of Joseph’s hair were scumbled over dark yellow ochre, and the white and yellow ochre strands of his beard over the medium grey of his mantle. Several significant pentimenti occurred during the painting stage as revealed by X-radiography: the position of Joseph’s right hand at top centre was altered from a profile view, the thumb moved further to the right, exposing more of the palm; the right eye of the shepherd on the left was changed from being fully open to half-closed, the gaze directed downward towards the Child; the face of the shepherd on the right was completely repainted, changed from a young man into an adolescent. Before these compositional changes occurred the painting corresponded, in these details, to the version at The Hague. The painting is in excellent condition, with very little retouching and barely any abrasion overall. A discoloured layer of old varnish is present. Retouching covers abrasion and small losses of the paint and ground layers along the edges, along the repaired vertical joins on the right (from Joseph’s forehead down through the Virgin’s left shoulder and the Child’s face) and left (from the old woman’s headdress down through the brass jug), and two vertical cracks at the top edge near centre. Scattered small retouches in the background at the upper right, in the vertical post of the shed, and in the figures (in red robe of shepherd on the left, the Virgin’s blue mantle over her left arm, Joseph’s grey robe, the green robe of the shepherd on the right, in the face of the elderly woman at centre left). Several thickly painted areas display a pronounced craquelure: the Virgin’s blue mantle; the Child’s white swaddling cloth. The painting underwent conservation treatment in 1836, 1874, 1936 and 1963. Provenance: Johan Gabriel Stenbock, Stockholm; Christina Beata Lillie, Stora Sundby, 1705–1727 (inv. 1727); Johan Gabriel Sack and Eva Bielke, Stockholm, 1727–1778; (sale, Stockholm, 1778); purchased 1778 by Gustav III; Gustav III 1792, no. 20); KM 1795, no. 69. Exhibited: Stockholm 1945, no. 85; Stockholm 1977, no. 87; Stockholm 2010, no. 73. Bibliography: NM Cat. 1867, p. 34; Sander II, p. 103; Göthe 1887, pp. 126–127; Rooses 1890, pp. 15–17, 19, 20, 29, 32, 35, 198, 236, opp. p. 14; Göthe 1893, pp. 158–159; Bredius in Kunstchronik, N.F. 17, 1905, column 33; Buschmann 1905, pp. 63–64, pl. I; Rooses 1906 (Engl. ed., 1908), pp. 15–18, 19–20, 28–29, 196, 228, opp. p. 14; Göthe 1910, pp. 177–178; Granberg 1911–1913, I, p. 114 no. 501; Burchard 1928, p. 213; Granberg 1929–1931, III, pp. 8, 13, 175; Held 1940, p. 29; Strömbom 1949, pp. 18, 76 no. 22; D’Hulst 1953, p. 136, fig. 25; Puyvelde 1953, pp. 30, 94, 173 n. 35, 187, fig. 21; NM Cat. 1958, p. 102; Gerson 1961, p. 14b; Jaffé 1968, p. 365; Ottawa 1968–1969, p. 39; Martin 1970, p. 88; Müller Hofstede 1971, pp. 278 n. 248, 279; Knipping 1974, II, p. 429; D’Hulst 1982, pp. 44, 87, 89, 91, fig. 55; Liedtke 1984, p. 122; Mauritshuis 1985, p. 220; NM Cat. 1990, p. 184; Antwerp 1993, see pp. 58–60 under no. A7, fig. A7a; Broos 1993, see pp. 153–158 under no. 17, fig. 1; Belkin and Healy 2004, p. 190; Liedtke 2006, p. 107 The theme of this painting, the “Adoration of the Shepherds”, taken from the account in the Gospel of Saint Luke (2:15–16), describes how some shepherds, having been informed by an angel of the birth of the Saviour, arrive at the manger in Bethlehem to adore the newborn Christ Child. In addition to Mary and Joseph, the artist has included in the scene not only two shepherds, but also the two shepherdesses, who, according to tradition, brought eggs and milk as gifts for the Child.1 Jordaens depicted the theme of the “Adoration” repeatedly between 1615, the year he became a master, and 1618, the date of the present painting, and then again only from the 1640s onwards. For a long time the present picture passed as the first of a sequence of “Adoration” scenes by Jordaens, but Burchard (1928) and D’Hulst (1953) have since described the painter’s early oeuvre so thoroughly that we now know that it was preceded by a number of Biblical works with life-size, halflength figures.2Especially important in the present context are the depictions of the theme in New York (The Metropolitan Museum of Art),3 The Hague (Mauritshuis), 4 and Brunswick (Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum). 5 The New York Adoration of the Shepherds, the artist’s earliest known dated work, is signed “I. IOR” and dated “1616”. The Adoration of the Shepherds at The Hague, similarly inscribed “I. IOR” (on the handle of the jug), is a nearly identical autograph version of the present picture, while the closely related painting in Brunswick introduces new figures and positions. Around 1645–1650, Jordaens then painted a full-size Adoration of the Shepherds (Paris, Musée du Louvre),6 in which we encounter many figures and elements from these paintings of thirty years earlier. A drawing in London (The British Museum), later enlarged by the artist, may initially have served as a preliminary study for the composition in the Stockholm and The Hague paintings.7 The predominance of “Nativity” scenes in Jordaens oeuvre of the late 1610s surely resulted from his desire to experiment with the different possibilities of depicting light. In the New York Adoration, a night piece, the principal light source, a candle in Joseph’s hand, is identifiable as the cause of the sharp contrasts between the bright and shadowed passages. The artist has abandoned the bright, clear Mannerist palette with half and broken tones characteristic of his work before 1616 and now seems more interested in using light to mould his figures in space. In this way Jordaens adopted the innovations of Adam Elsheimer and Caravaggio, the two artists most associated at that time with the phenomenon of light in art, possibly through the intermediary of models by Rubens. Though neither his pupil nor assistant, Jordaens seems to have had free access to Rubens’ studio and art collection and would thus have been acquainted with the many Caravaggesque scenes painted by the master following his return from Italy.8 Since Jordaens himself never visited Italy, his only direct encounter with Caravaggio’s painting occurred sometime after 1617, when the Madonna of the Rosary (Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum) was acquired for the Dominican church of St. Paul at Antwerp. Perhaps it was the confrontation with this important work that prompted Jordaens, in his three Adoration scenes from around 1617/1618 (The Hague, Stockholm, Brunswick), to abandon the artificial light so characteristic of his earlier depictions in favour of a natural lighting and a more even distribution of shade more attuned to Caravaggio’s art. In these Adoration scenes the light comes from an invisible source, and Jordaens used the artifice of a brass jug as a repoussoir and reflector of light. Van Mander had greatly admired similar effects in the night pieces of Jacopo Bassano, whom he praised for his evocative scenes in which “candles, torches, and burning lamps hang, and pots and kettles receive the radiance”.9 The Caravaggesque illumination encloses the Virgin and Child in a seemingly very intimate space, and, along with the closely cropped composition, brings the viewer into the circle of figures. Müller Hofstede (1971) observed that, while Rubens’ response to Caravaggio was largely formal, Jordaens’ “adoption, synthesis and intensification” of the Caravaggesque qualities in the art of Rubens supported a “specific [kind of] narrative expression, a special iconographic style”, found principally in his paintings of the “Holy Family” and such closely related subjects as the “Adoration of the Shepherds”.10 From Caravaggio and Bassano, Jordaens also borrowed the rustic realism of his figures. Vlieghe described his preference for realistic settings and “simple folk characters” as “a constant feature of Jordaens’ [early] work”, which is “abundantly apparent in his devotional pictures”.11While the halflength devotional format, eminently suitable for display in a private house, had a long-standing tradition in Netherlandish art, the densely packed, relief-like arrangement of figures in Jordaens’ paintings must be considerably indebted to the half-length figure groupings of Abraham Janssens. Bredius (1905) and Rooses (1906) both felt that the Stockholm painting was of inferior quality to the version at The Hague. Gerson (1961), followed by Broos (1993), then suggested that The Hague composition was literally repeated by the artist in the Stockholm panel. The closely related painting in Brunswick shows new figures and positions: a third young shepherd has replaced the old shepherdess, and the young shepherd on the left now leans on the brass jug, so that we see part of his back. In the Stockholm and Brunswick versions, the shadows are accented more darkly and heavily than in the painting at The Hague, especially in the faces of the Virgin and the young shepherds. Many of the heads were repeated identically by Jordaens in these Adoration scenes, though in different combinations: the bearded old man (The Hague, Stockholm), the old woman (The Hague, Stockholm), the young woman (The Hague, Stockholm, Brunswick), the young man on the left (The Hague, Stockholm), the young man on the right (Stockholm, Brunswick). This recycling of head types implies the existence of lost prototypes, whether drawings or oil studies, and their comparable sizes in different paintings suggests the use of some method of mechanical transfer, possibly by partial cartoons. The artist seems to have used the same model for the Virgin in the Adoration at The Hague and for Mary Magdalene in a contemporary work, the Temptation of Mary Magdalene at Lille (Musée des Beaux-Arts).12 Apparently he was so pleased with the motif of the head of the young man on the left in his earlier New York Adoration – where it is lit from below – that he repeated it in the Adorations at The Hague and Stockholm, as well as the Lille Temptation.13 Broos (1993) took the development outlined above as his starting point for establishing a chronology of the undated works: from his Adoration of 1616 (New York) Jordaens retained a few elements for use in a new composition (The Hague) of c. 1617; in 1618 he repeated it quite literally (Stockholm) while, almost contemporaneously, creating a fourth version with a few new figures (Brunswick). The correctness of Broos’ reconstruction is borne out by X-ray examinations of the Stockholm (see Technical Notes) and The Hague panels, which shed interesting new light on the artist’s working methods. An X-radiograph of the Stockholm painting revealed that at an initial stage, before alterations were carried out by the artist, several elements corresponded exactly in the two versions: the same sitter was apparently used as model for the young shepherd on the right; the open gaze of the shepherd on the left and the position of Joseph’s right hand were initially identical in both works. Furthermore, an Xradiograph of the panel at The Hague showed that Jordaens enlarged Mary’s blue veil, so that it would cover a greater part of her forehead and the head of the Christ Child, in a manner corresponding to her veil as shown in the Stockholm version. In the panel at The Hague, a young man was originally painted to the upper left of Mary’s head, as may still be seen at Brunswick, while the old shepherdess was initially missing from the composition. The head in profile of the shepherd, a young man, on the right in the painting at The Hague has a portrait-like character that goes well beyond that of any analogous figure in the painting. This distinctive head, subsequently changed into a more idealized boyish type in the Stockholm replica, is so conspicuous that one wonders if it might possibly be the portrait of a donor, presented as a witness to a biblical event. CF 1 See Réau 1955–1959, II, pp. 233–234. 2 Jordaens’ earliest known Adoration of the Shepherds (oil on wood, 89.2 x 111.1 cm) is a newly discovered painting of c. 1615 in an American private collection; for which see W. Liedtke, “An early work by Jacob Jordaens rediscovered”, The Burlington Magazine 148 (February 2006): pp. 107–108. 3 Oil on canvas (transferred from wood), 106.7 x 76.2 cm, inscribed “I. IOR Fe/1616”, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, inv. no. 67.187.76; see Liedtke 1984, I, pp. 121–126, II, colour pl. IX, pl. 52; and Antwerp 1992/1993, I, cat. no. A 7, illus. 4 Oil on wood, 125 x 95.7 cm, inscribed “I. IOR”, The Hague, Mauritshuis, inv. no. 937; for which see Broos 1993, cat. no. 17, repr. in colour on p. 156. 5 Oil on wood, 125 x 79 cm, Brunswick, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum, inv. no. 116; see Van Puyvelde 1953, p. 94; and Brunswick 1976, cat. no. 116, fig. 24. 6 Oil on canvas, 185 x 180 cm, Paris, Musée du Louvre, inv. no. R.F.1981- 58; see Foucart 1983, pp. 39–40, illus. 7 Black and red chalk, brown wash, watercolour and body colour, 458 x 486 mm, London, The British Museum, inv. no. Chambers Hall, Esq., 1852.6.12.199; see Held 1933, 220; and Ottawa 1968–1969, pp. 220–221 no.261, illus. 8 See Healy in Antwerp 2004, pp. 188–190 (under no.36). 9 Van Mander 1604, fol. 32a (chapter “On Reflection, Reverberation, Refulgence, or Radiance”), cited by Broos 1993, p. 157. 10 See Müller Hofstede 1971, pp. 278–279, cited by Liedtke 2006, p. 108. 11 Vlieghe 1998, p. 35. 12 Oil on wood, 125 x 97 cm, Lille, Musée des Beaux-Arts, inv. no. 77 (427); see Ottawa 1968/1969, p. 73, cat. no. 7. 13 Jordaens was certainly familiar with Adam Elsheimer’s The Mocking of Ceres (1608), or a copy of it, since he modelled the figures of the young shepherd on the left and Joseph holding a lit candle in his New York Adoration of the Shepherds of 1616 (The Metropolitan Museum of Art), after those of Ceres and the old woman in this picture. The maidservant on the left in NM 176 was similarly modelled after Ceres. Rubens owned a copy of Elsheimer’s work, probably acquired in the mid-1610s, possibly from the Antwerp collector, Cornelis van der Geest. See Antwerp 2004, under no. 4 [K. Lohse Belkin].[End] The Gospel of Luke recounts how some shepherds, informed by an angel of the birth of the Saviour, arrive at the manger in Bethlehem to joyfully adore the newborn. The scene shows the Holy Family and the shepherds, but also the legendary shepherdesses who brought gifts of eggs and milk. Jordaens’ encounter with Caravaggio’s Madonna of the Rosary in the Dominican church at Antwerp may have inspired the realism of his rustic figures, as well as strong natural lighting and deeply accented shadows.
Motif categoryReligion/Mythology
Collection
TechniquePainting
Object category
Keyword
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