Saint Jerome in the Wilderness

c. 1490/1500

A balding man with a long gray beard kneels on the edge of a stream, next to a lion, while two young boys stand in a rocky alcove in the landscape background of this vertical painting. The man and boys all have pale skin. The man, Saint Jerome, kneels with his body angled to our right as he looks up with dark eyes. His wispy hair and full beard are streaked with silver and honey gold. The faint gold line of his halo nearly disappears in the background. His nose and high cheekbones are flushed, his mouth slightly open. His long-sleeved ivory-white robe puddles under his knees. The robe is open to create a deep V that reaches to the forest-green sash tied around his waist. He holds a rock in his right hand, to our left, by his side, and holds the palm of his other hand up. The lion lies with its head lifted, looking at or toward us, on the far side of Saint Jerome. The silvery water of the river curves around gray boulders in the lower right corner of the painting and winds into the distance. The riverbank is covered in olive-green grass with some small white flowers. Behind Saint Jerome, the land rises to a cave-like outcropping. The two boys stand facing each other in the shadowy entrance. Both have blond hair, faint gold halos, and are barefoot. They wear gold-colored tunics, and each touches the chest of the other. The boy to our left wears a wine-red cloak and holds a long staff topped with a small cross. The other boy wears a white cloak. Plants and trees grow over the rocks above. The river curves through a flat field lined with trees, leading back to a town with towers and spires painted in tones of sky blue. Pale blue mountains rise along the water’s edge beyond the town. The sky deepens from light yellow along the horizon to icy blue above, where a few puffy clouds float along the top edge of the composition.

Media Options

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On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 20

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    tempera on poplar panel

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 60 x 41.9 cm (23 5/8 x 16 1/2 in.)
    framed: 73.7 x 55.3 x 9.8 cm (29 x 21 3/4 x 3 7/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1939.1.280

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Sir Thomas Gage Saunders Sebright, 8th bt. [1802-1864], Beechwood Park, Hertfordshire, by 1856;[1] by descent to Sir Giles Edward Sebright, 13th bt. [1896-1954], Beechwood Park; (his sale, Christie, Manson & Woods, London, 2 July 1937, no. 139, as Venetian School); purchased by (Volterra, Florence) for (Count Alessandro Contini Bonacossi, Florence); sold October 1937 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[2] gift 1939 to NGA.
[1] Gustav Friedrich Waagen, in Galleries and Cabinets of Art in Great Britain...Visited in 1854 and 1856..., London, 1857: 327, describes in Beechwood "a landscape, with St. Jerome on the right, who, with a stone in his left hand, is doing penance before a small crucifix fastened high upon a tree..." that he lists as "Raphael (?)" but which he concludes "[reminds] me most of Timoteo Viti." The provenance sometimes given for the panel, as having been in the "collection of Count B. Pinamonte, Ferrara," comes from the 1937 bill of sale between Contini Bonacossi and the Kress Foundation (see note 2). According to Sir Ellis Waterhouse, this provenance is spurious (see note in Fern Rusk Shapley's hand, in NGA curatorial files).
[2] The bill of sale from Contini Bonacossi to the Kress Foundation, for this and several other paintings, is dated 20 October 1937 (copy in NGA curatorial files). See also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1849.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

2013

  • Face to Face: Flanders, Florence, and Renaissance Painting, The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, 2013-2014, pl. 36.

Bibliography

1857

  • Waagen, Gustav Friedrich. Galleries and Cabinets of Art in Great Britain. London, 1857: 327, as by Raphael (?).

1941

  • Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1941: 149-150, no. 391, as by Pietro Perugino.

1942

  • Book of Illustrations. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 247, repro. 164, as by Pietro Perugino.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 93, repro., as by Pietro Perugino.

  • Camesasca, Ettore. Tutta la pittura del Perugino. Milan, 1959: 55, pl. 38, as by Pietro Perugino.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 100, as by Pietro Perugino.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 88, repro.

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XV-XVI Century. London, 1968: 99, fig. 238.

  • Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Central Italian and North Italian Schools. 3 vols. London, 1968: 1:333, as Workshop of Pietro Perugino.

1969

  • Camesasca, Ettore. L’opera completa del Perugino. Milan, 1969: 92, cat. 26, as by Pietro Perugino.

1972

  • Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, MA, 1972: 161, 646, as by Pietro Perugino.

1974

  • Fahy, Everett. “Review. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools XII-XV Century by Fern Rusk Shapley; Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools XV-XVI Century by Fern Rusk Shapley; Early Italian Paintings in the Yale University Art Gallery by Charles Seymour; Italian Primitives: The Case History of a Collection and its Conservation by Charles Seymour.” Art Bulletin, vol. 56, no. 2 (1974): 285, as by the Pisan Follower of Pinturicchio.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 262, repro., as by Pietro Perugino.

1976

  • Fahy, Everett. Some Followers of Domenico Ghirlandajo. New York, 1976: 189, as by the Pisan Follower of Pinturicchio.

1979

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1979: 1:363-364; 2:pl. 262, as by Studio of Pietro Perugino.

1981

  • Rowlands, Eliot W. “Review of Fern Rusk Shapley. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings 1979.” Apollo 144, no. 237 (November 1981): 353.

  • Ferino Pagden, Sylvia. “Gli affreschi della Madonnuccia in San Martino in Campo e l’enigma di Andrea d’Assisi detto l’Ingegno.” Esercizi 4 (1981): 73, 84, as by Andrea d’Assisi called l’Ingegno.

1983

  • Shearman, John. The Early Italian Pictures in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen. Cambridge, 1983: 192.

  • Szabó, George. Masterpieces of Italian Drawing in the Robert Lehman Collection. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1983: n.p., under cat. 19.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 108, no. 78, color repro.

  • Aspetti dell’arte a Roma prima e dopo Raffaello. Exh. cat. Palazzo Venezia, Rome. 1984: 49-50.

  • Scarpellini, Pietro. Perugino. Milan, 1984: 30, 80, cat. 36, fig. 55, as Collaborator of Pietro Perugino ( Andrea d’Assisi called l’Ingegno?).

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 303, repro.

  • Wood, Jeryldene Marie. “The Early Paintings of Perugino.” Ph.D. diss., University of Virginia, 1985: 285, cat. 26, fig. 61, as School of Perugino.

1987

  • Perrig, Alexander. “Die theoriebedingten Landschaftsformen in der italienischen Malerei des 14. Und 15. Jahrhunderts.” In Wolfram Prinz and Andreas Beyer, eds. Die Kunst und das Studium der Natur vom 14. zum 16. Jahrhundert. Weinheim, 1987: 60 n. 47.

1989

  • Todini, Filippo. La pittura umbra dal Duecento al primo Cinquecento. 2 vols. Milan, 1989: 1:273, as Workshop of Pietro Perugino.

1997

  • Antenucci Becherer, Joseph. "Perugino in America: Masterpieces, Myths, and Mistaken Identities." In Joseph Antenucci Becherer, ed. Pietro Perugino: Master of the Italian Renaissance. Exh. cat., The Grand Rapids Art Museum, Grand Rapids, 1997: 116.

1998

  • Nucciarelli, Franceso Ivan. Studi sul Pinturicchio. Dalle prime prove alla Cappella Sistina. Ellera Umbra (Perugia), 1998: 179, fig. 50.

1999

  • Bellosi, Luciano. “The Landscape alla fiamminga.” In Victor M. Schmidt et. al., eds. Italy and the Low Countries—Artistic Relations. The Fifteenth Century. Proceedings of the Sympsoium Held at Museum Catharijneconvent, Utrecht, 14 March 1994. Florence, 1999: 98-100, fig. 1.

2003

  • Boskovits, Miklós, and David Alan Brown, et al. Italian Paintings of the Fifteenth Century. The Systematic Catalogue of the National Gallery of Art. Washington, D.C., 2003: 565-568, color repro.

2006

  • Fahy, Everett. "Early Italian paintings in Washington and Philadelphia." The Burlington Magazine 148, no. 1241 (August 2006): 539 n. 5, as by Andrea d'Assisi called Ingegno.

2013

  • Danieli, Michele. "Un peruginesco in incognito: Amico Aspertini." Saggi e memorie di storia dell'arte 37 (2013): 37, 39, fig. 61, as Circle of Pietro Perugino.

Wikidata ID

Q20174557

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