Pax with a Miniature of the Nativity

c. 1480 (pax frame); c. 1850/1875 (miniature)

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    gilded silver, copper, brass, enamel with pearls and glass bead, containing a miniature painted on parchment (?); glass cover, cloth inner lining

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 23.6 x 13.1 x 6.7 cm (9 5/16 x 5 3/16 x 2 5/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1961.9.196

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Reportedly Trivulzio collection, Milan; (Count Alessandro Contini Bonacossi, Florence); purchased by 1937 or 1939 by Samuel H. Kress, New York,[1] as Venetian, c. 1400; gift 27 February 1950 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[2] gift 1961 to NGA.
[1] A. M. Hind to John Walker, 12 June 1951, states that Hind first heard (from Alfred Frankfurter, editor of The Art News) of the Trivulzio nielli, with which this enamel was acquired, in Kress's hands in 1937. Marie-Madeleine Gauthier, in a letter to Alison Luchs of 25 June 1984, mentions a sale of the Trivulzio collection in London, 6 June 1939; no catalogue has been located.
[2] Deposition by Herbert L. Spencer, executive director, Samuel H. Kress Foundation, 21 August 1956, on file in the secretary-general counsel's office files, National Gallery of Art, Kress no. 0-153.

Associated Names

Bibliography

1993

  • Distelberger, Rudolf, Alison Luchs, Philippe Verdier, and Timonthy H. Wilson. Western Decorative Arts, Part I: Medieval, Renaissance, and Historicizing Styles including Metalwork, Enamels, and Ceramics. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, 1993: 71-76, fig. 72.

Wikidata ID

Q62286726

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