Church of Santa Maria della Febbre, Rome

1629

Pieter Jansz Saenredam

Artist, Dutch, 1597 - 1665

A sand-colored church dominates the right two thirds of this canvas in this horizontal landscape. Low-lying blue-green mountains recede into the deep distance to our left. To our right, the building is made up of staggered, squared-off walls with rectangular windows set at seemingly irregular intervals. To the left and near the center of the composition, a circular building has a low domed roof. Plants growing on the building suggest that this is a ruin. A tall obelisk stands in front of the round portion of the church, to the left of center in the composition. We look into the arched ruins or construction of another building behind and above the church. A dirt road crosses diagonally from our left to right in front of the structure. A person wearing a red hat and purple robe sits inside a carriage drawn by two black horses. The driver wears a blue uniform, as do two men walking alongside the carriage.

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Pieter Saenredam, who is best known for his paintings of church interiors, had broad humanistic interests, ranging from the history and development of the Netherlands to the literature of antiquity. A prized source of information about Rome was a sketchbook of antiquities made in the 1530s by Maerten van Heemskerck (1498–1574), which Saenredam would eventually acquire.

This painting is based on one of the images in Heemskerck’s sketchbook. The ancient, circular chapel of Santa Maria della Febbre in the foreground was originally built as a mausoleum in the second century. After 1506 the chapel was converted into the sacristy of the new Saint Peter’s basilica, which was then under construction behind it. The massive piers of the crossing that would eventually support the famous dome designed by Michelangelo are clearly visible in Saenredam’s painting. When Saenredam painted the scene in 1629, the dome had already been completed, and the Egyptian obelisk in the foreground, quarried in the thirteenth century BC and taken to Rome in the first century AD, had been moved to a different location on Saint Peter’s Square, some 275 yards away.

Interestingly, Saenredam portrayed Saint Peter’s as though it were an abandoned ruin overgrown with weeds. He created a sense of depth in the landscape by overlapping layers of contrasting tone, moving from a dark foreground through the buildings’ pinkish yellow to the bright blues and greens of low-lying distant hills. It is probable that the cardinal in his horse-drawn carriage and the other figures in the landscape were painted by Saenredam’s colleague Pieter Post (1608–1669).

On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 47

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on panel

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 37.8 x 70.5 cm (14 7/8 x 27 3/4 in.)
    framed: 51.4 x 84.4 x 5.7 cm (20 1/4 x 33 1/4 x 2 1/4 in.)

  • Accession

    1961.9.34

More About this Artwork

Scholarly Article:  Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century: Church of Santa Maria della Febbre, Rome, 1629

This horizontal painting shows a group of eight light-skinned musicians and onlookers gathered closely around a rectangular, carpet-covered table. The front edge of the table runs parallel to the bottom edge of the painting, and seems close to us. Shown from about the waist up, the men and women’s vivid lapis-blue, coral-red, buttercup-yellow, lilac-purple, and moss-green garments fall in crisp folds. Bright reflections on the fabric suggest a satin-like material. Two women wear feathers in their hair and one man’s hat is plumed. One man, wearing crimson red and black, sits with his back to us to our left on the near side of the table. He holds the neck of a bass viol, about the size of a cello, with his left hand, and points to pages of an open music book with the bow in his right hand. The other people cluster on the far side of the table. A man to the left plays a violin; a woman at the center plays a guitar-sized bandora, and a woman to our right plays a lute. The musicians, along with a man who leans over the table from between the two women, look down at the music books. A young man behind the woman at the center holds up a glass of pale liquid with his right hand as he touches his left forefinger to his smiling lips. A man and woman stand close together in the background to our right, in the top right corner of the canvas.

Scholarly Series:  Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Friedrich, king of Prussia.[1] (sale, Frederik Muller and Co., Amsterdam, 25 November 1924, no. 60); Anton W.M. Mensing [1866-1936], Amsterdam;[2] (his estate sale, Frederik Muller and Co., Amsterdam, 15 November 1938, no. 96); (D.A. Hoogendijk, Amsterdam); J.A.G. Sandberg, Wassenaar, in 1950; private collection, The Netherlands; (D.A. Hoogendijk, Amsterdam), by 1953; (Frederick A. Stern, Inc., New York); sold 1954 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[3] gift 1961 to NGA.
[1] This information is in the 1924 sale catalogue; it has not yet been determined which of the Prussian kings by this name owned the painting. There are two seals on the reverse of the panel, but neither has a legible imprint.
[2] An annotated copy of the 1924 sale catalogue cites Huber as the buyer. If this is true, he may well have been acting as an agent for Mensing.
[3] See The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/530.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1937

  • Pieter Jansz. Saenredam 1597-1665, Museum Boymans, Rotterdam; Museum Fodor, Amsterdam, 1937-1938, no. 1.

1950

  • Tentoonstelling Kunstbezit van Oud-Alumni der Leidse Universiteit, Stedelijk Museum Lakenhal, Leiden, 1950, no. 47.

  • Le Paysage Hollandais au XVIIe Siècle, Orangerie des Tuileries, Paris, 1950, no. 82.

1961

  • Pieter Jansz. Saenredam, Centraal Museum, Utrecht, 1961, no. 111.

1998

  • A Collector's Cabinet, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1998, no. 51.

Bibliography

1907

  • Thieme, Ulrich, and Felix Becker, eds. Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart. 37 vols. Leipzig, 1907-1950: 29(1935):306.

1915

  • Bredius, Abraham. Künstler-Inventare: Urkunden zur Geschichte der holländischen Kunst des XVIten, XVIIten und XVIIIten Jahrhunderts. 8 vols. The Hague, 1915-1922: 7(1921):83.

1931

  • Regteren Altena, J.Q. van. "Saenredam Archeoloog." Oud Holland 48 (1931): 1-2, repro. 2.

1935

  • Swillens, P.T.A. Pieter Janszoon Saenredam: Schilder van Haarlem, 1597-1665. Amsterdam, 1935: 8, 83, no. 38, repro. 28.

1937

  • Hannema, Dirk. Pieter Jansz. Saenredam, 1597-1665: schilderijen en tekeningen. Exh. cat. Museum Boymans, Rotterdam; Museum Fodor, Amsterdam. Rotterdam, 1937: no. 1.

1938

  • Trivas, Numa S. "Pieter Saenredam." Apollo 27 (March 1938): 154-155.

1948

  • Bernt, Walther. Die niederländischen Maler des 17. Jahrhunderts. 3 vols. Munich, 1948: 3:no. 1017, repro.

1950

  • Musée de l'Orangerie. Le paysage hollandais au XVIIe siècle. Exh. cat. Musée de l'Orangerie, Paris, 1950: no. 82.

  • Pelinck, Egbert. Tentoonstelling kunstbezit van oud-alumni der Leidse universiteit. Exh. cat. Stedelijk Museum De Lakenhal, Leiden, 1950: no. 47.

1951

  • Bersier, Jean Eugène. L'influence d'Italie dans la peinture hollandaise. Paris, 1951: 102 n. 1.

1954

  • Gudlaugsson, Sturla J. "Aanvullingen omtrent Pieter Post’s werkzaamheid als schilder." Oud Holland 69 (1954): 59-71.

1956

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection Acquired by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation 1951-56. Introduction by John Walker, text by William E. Suida and Fern Rusk Shapley. National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1956: 158, no. 61, repro.

  • Walker, John. "The Nation's Newest Old Masters." The National Geographic Magazine 110, no. 5 (November 1956): 646, color repro. 652.

1957

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Comparisons in Art: A Companion to the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. London, 1957 (reprinted 1959): pl. 157.

1958

  • Magnuson, Torgil. Studies in Roman quattrocento architecture. Stockholm, 1958: 190.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 323, repro.

1960

  • Plietzsch, Eduard. Holländische und flämische Maler des XVII. Jahrhunderts. Leipzig, 1960: 123.

1961

  • Walker, John, Guy Emerson, and Charles Seymour. Art Treasures for America: An Anthology of Paintings & Sculpture in the Samuel H. Kress Collection. London, 1961: 156-158, color repro. pl. 149.

  • Houtzager, Maria E., P. T. A. Swillens, and Iohannes Q. van Regteren Altena. Catalogue Raisonné of the Works by Pieter Jansz. Saenredam. Exh. cat. Centraal Museum, Utrecht, 1961: 164-165, no. 111, pl. 115.

1962

  • Pensa, M. "Pieter Jansz. Saenredam." Arte Antica e Moderna 18 (April-June 1962): xi, repro.

1963

  • Janson, Horst W. The Sculpture of Donatello: Incorporating the Notes and Photos of the Late Jenö Lányi. Princeton, 1963: 97.

1965

  • National Gallery of Art. Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. Washington, 1965: 119.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 107, repro.

1970

  • Vey, Horst. Sammlung Herbert Girardet: holländische und flämische Meister. Exh. cat. Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, Cologne; Museum Boymans-van Beuningen, Rotterdam. Cologne, 1970: cited in discussion of no. 48.

1975

  • National Gallery of Art. European paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. Washington, 1975: 316, repro.

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. New York, 1975: 298, no. 400, repro.

  • Hülsen, Christian, and Hermann Egger. Die römischen Skizzenbücher von Marten van Heemskerck im Königlichen Kupferstichkabinett zu Berlin. 2 vols. Reprint of Berlin 1913-1916 ed. Soest, 1975: 7.

1977

  • Eisler, Colin. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: European Schools Excluding Italian. Oxford, 1977: 141-142, fig. 129, as Church of Santa Maria della Febbre, with St. Peter's Under Construction, Rome.

1980

  • Duparc, Frederik J. Mauritshuis: Hollandse schilderkunst - landschappen 17de eeuw. The Hague, 1980: 77–79, nos. 765–766.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 298, no. 394, color repro.

1985

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. Washington, 1985: 365, repro.

1989

  • Schwartz, Gary, and Marten Jan Bok. Pieter Saenredam: de schilder in zijn tijd. Translated by Loekie Schwartz. Maarssen and The Hague, 1989: 73 fig. 83, 76, 105, 204, 272, no. 111.

  • Schwartz, Gary, and Marten Jan Bok. Pieter Saenredam: The Painter and His Time. New York, 1989: 73 fig. 83, 76, 105, 204, 272, no. 111.

1995

  • Wheelock, Arthur K., Jr. Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, 1995: 349-353, color repro. 351.

  • Slive, Seymour, and Jakob Rosenberg. Dutch painting 1600-1800. Pelican History of Art. Revised and expanded ed. New Haven, 1995: 264.

1998

  • Wheelock, Arthur K., Jr. A Collector's Cabinet. Exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1998: 30, 68, no. 51, repro.

2004

  • Butler, Kim E. "'Reddita lux est': Raphael and the Pursuit of Sacred Eloquence in Leonine Rome." In Artists at Court: Image-making and identity, 1300-1550. Edited by Stephen J. Campbell. Boston, 2004: 145, fig. 9.4.

2005

  • Kuretsky, Susan Donahue. Time and Transformation in Seventeenth-Century Dutch Art. Exh. cat. Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie; John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota; J.B. Speed Art Museum, Louisville. Seattle, 2005: 31-32, fig. 19.

Inscriptions

lower center on paper attached to base of obelisk: P. Saenreda.fe. / Ao 1629

Wikidata ID

Q20177085

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