| Lamentation of Christ | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Artist | Gerard David |
| Year | 1515-1523 |
| Medium | Oil on oak |
| Dimensions | 63 cm× 61.5 cm(25 in× 24.2 in) |
| Location | National Gallery, London, UK |
| Accession | NG1078 |
The Lamentation of Christ is a painting of the common subject of the Lamentation of Christ by the painter and manuscript illuminator Gerard David, originally a wing of a now dismantled and lost altarpiece. [1] [2]
It portrays the body of Christ wrapped in his shroud and being anointed. Mary Magdalene is at his feet, as the Virgin Mary holds him in her arms, weeping for his death watched over by Saint John. Four other grieving figures are present; they may be Saint Anne, the mother of the Virgin, and women who followed Christ. [2] [3]
While its exact dating is debated, it seems likely that it was completed between 1515 and 1523. This painting and David's Adoration of the Kings , also in the National Gallery (NG 1079), were two wings from a single altarpiece. The theme of the Lamentation of Christ was common in medieval and Renaissance art, although this treatment, dating back to a subject known as the Anointing of Christ, is unusual for the period. David was influenced by Jan van Eyck's approach to realism. David was innovative in his depiction of religious subjects, which he represented not as icons but rather as approachable individuals. Additionally, David was known for the originality of his treatment of color and light. [1]
For all the known history of the painting it has been together with the NG 1079 Adoration, but this goes no further back than early 19th-century London. Whether the two originally formed part of the same polyptych is not quite certain, but it seems most likely. [4] The Lamentation is some 3 cm larger in both dimensions, and its underdrawing "is inconsistent in style and some parts can be reconciled with the underdrawing of the Adoration", but others not. [5] In the two panels the figures are about the same size, and the horizons at the same level, and no other panels of these dimensions are attributed to David or his workshop. Both panels are planed down at the back, and may originally have been painted on both sides, as parts of the wings of an altarpiece on the Life of Christ or Life of the Virgin, with a central panel about four times the size of these ones. [6]
Both this and the companion Adoration may have been in a sale of the pictures of Frederick Benjamin King (a bankrupt sugar-refiner) at Christie's in London in June 1830, where Lot 82 was an Adoration described as by "J. de Maubeuge", that is to say Jan Gossaert, who was born in Maubeuge. The Lamentation was merely described as "Flemish". They fetched £4 and £4,12 shillings respectively, but different buyers are recorded. Both paintings have a pink paper label inscribed "King 157" pasted on their reverses. [7]
If they were separated at this point, they were reunited by 1831, when their certain history begins, in the collection of Karl Aders, a German merchant resident in London. Both were auctioned again in August 1835 and bought by a Dr Willis, later passing to a surgeon, Joseph Henry Green, who lived in Monken Hadley, a little way north of London. Both paintings were exhibited in the huge and important Art Treasures Exhibition, held in Manchester in 1857. Green died in 1863 and his widow (Anne Eliza, d. 1879) bequeathed all the Dutch and Flemish paintings in the collection to the National Gallery, who received them in 1880. No loans to outside exhibitions are recorded since (to 1998). [8]
Gerard David was an Early Netherlandish painter and manuscript illuminator known for his brilliant use of color. Only a bare outline of his life survives, although some facts are known. He may have been the Meester gheraet van brugghe who became a master of the Antwerp guild in 1515. He was very successful in his lifetime and probably ran two workshops, in Antwerp and Bruges. Like many painters of his period, his reputation diminished in the 17th century until he was rediscovered in the 19th century.
Jan Gossaert was a French-speaking painter from the Low Countries also known as Jan Mabuse or Jennyn van Hennegouwe (Hainaut), as he called himself when he matriculated in the Guild of Saint Luke, at Antwerp, in 1503. He was one of the first painters of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance painting to visit Italy and Rome, which he did in 1508–09, and a leader of the style known as Romanism, which brought elements of Italian Renaissance painting to the north, sometimes with a rather awkward effect. He achieved fame across at least northern Europe, and painted religious subjects, including large altarpieces, but also portraits and mythological subjects, including some nudity.
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