Madonna and Child with St John the Baptist and St Francis

Artist/Maker

Material / Technique

Dimensionsh x w: Mått 73 x 40 cm h x w x d: Ram 104 x 56 x 10 cm

Inventory numberNM 5173

Other titlesTitle (sv): Madonna med barnet och Johannes döparen och den helige Franciscus Title (en): Madonna and Child with St John the Baptist and St Francis

DescriptionCatalogue raisonné: Description in Italian Paintings: Three Centuries of Collecting, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2015, cat.no. 129: TECHNICAL NOTES: The support is a single board of poplar. The panel and the gilded frame were probably cut from the same board. There is one vertical crack in the wood. The verso is painted brown. The gesso ground is white, with a layer of red bole under the gilding. Under the flesh colours there is green earth underpainting. There are extensive retouches and overpaintings. For example, the steps below the Virgin have been overpainted. The outlines of the Virgin are reinforced. There is a thick layer of yellowed varnish. Documented restorations: 1960: Consolidation of flaking colour, filling and retouching of paint losses; 1975: Consolidation of flaking colour; 1988: Consolidation of the paint layer. Filling and retouching. Crack in the panel glued. Retouching, partial varnish. PROVENANCE: Private collection, Budapest; Gunnar Björkman 1936; deposited at the Nationalmuseum 1946; gift of Gunnar Björkman, 1954. BIBLIOGRAPHY: NM Cat. 1958, p. 118 (as Masolino, attributed to); Berenson 1963, p. 137; NM Cat. 1990, p. 212 (as Masolino, attributed to); Roberts 1993, pp. 203–205. The Madonna and Child are flanked by St John the Baptist and St Francis. Two flying angels are crowning the Virgin, with a crown that is punched into the golden background. The head of the Madonna and the angels are in a fairly good state of preservation, but the lower part of the panel has been extensively repainted. According to older photographs, the steps on which the Madonna is seated were originally a chequered floor incised into the golden ground. Even the Christ Child seems to have been repainted at some unknown date. The painting has a provenance from a private collection at a castle near Budapest. It was brought to Sweden in 1934, purchased by Gunnar Björkman in 1936 and later given to the Nationalmuseum in 1954. The panel was attributed to Masolino da Panicale by Raimond van Marle in 1934, an attribution confirmed by Osvald Sirén and Henrik Cornell in 1936.¹ Berenson then changed the attribution by adding the collaboration of Andrea di Gusto, especially concerning the angels surrounding the Madonna.² This attribution was maintained in the 1990 Nationalmuseum catalogue of European paintings and slightly changed to Masolino and his workshop in Perri Lee Robert’s publication Masolino da Panicale from 1993.³ Masolino is known to have painted several panels of the Madonna and Child,⁴ but no painting has so far been connected with his years in Hungary. Considering its provenance, its partly high quality and its present state, one could suggest that the Nationalmuseum panel is in fact the only known painting preserved from Masolino’s period in Hungary. As Roberts points out, the head of the Nationalmuseum Madonna shows great similarities to the Madonna and Child with Four Angels and God the Father in the Alte Pinakothek in Munich, dated c. 1420, but if the Nationalmuseum painting was executed during Masolino’s stay in Hungary, it was obviously a commission for Filippo Scolari and can with certainty be dated to 1425/26. je 1 The attribution is confirmed by correspondence between the previous owner and the experts on Masolino at the time, Raimond Van Marle (1934), Osvald Sirén (1936) and Henrik Cornell (1936); NM Archives, Dokumentationsarkivet, “Masolino da Panicale”. 2 NM Archives, Dokumentationsarkivet, “Masolino da Panicale”; Berenson 1963, vol. 1, p. 137. 3 Roberts 1993, pp. 203–205. 4 See Roberts 1993. [End]

Motif categoryReligion/Mythology

Collection

MaterialOil paint

TechniqueWoodcut (Printing technique, Relief print)

Object category

Keyword