The Mass of Saint Gregory

c. 1490/1500

Israhel van Meckenem

Associated Names
Israhel van Meckenem

Artist, German, c. 1445 - 1503

This print depicts a scene inside a church with a gathering around an altar. In the center of the print, a man sits, emerging from a hollow structure on top of the altar. The man is bare chested, with long flowing hair and a halo around his head. He looks down, his head turned to the left and his hands on top of one another. He has a wound on his chest and one on the back of his visible hand. Behind him is a large cross, which stands in front of several tall panels decorated with scenes of conflict and battle. There are two tall candles on either side of him, and an open book and a chalice are in front of him. A large group of people is gathered around the sides of the altar, with three men in the front kneeling in front of it. These men all wear robes and are bald on the tops of their heads. The architecture of the church features pointed arches in the ceiling with ribbed vaults. The floor below the gathered group is a grid of small squares. There is a small line of text at the bottom of the print, and the background is beige paper.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    engraving on two joined sheets of laid paper

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 46.5 × 29.4 cm (18 5/16 × 11 9/16 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1954.12.91

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Lehrs, Vol. 9, p.289, no. 354, State i/ii

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

(Richard H. Zinser, Forest Hills, NY); purchased by Lessing J. Rosenwald [1891-1979], 1953; gift to NGA, 1954.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1960

  • Gothic to Baroque, Allentown Art Museum, 1960, no. 69.

1967

  • Fifteenth Century Engravings of Northern Europe from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., NGA, 1967-1968, no. 215, repro.

2023

  • Art of Enterprise: Israhel van Meckenem and his Late Medieval Print Shop, Chazen Museum of Art, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 2023-2024.

Bibliography

1908

  • Lehrs, Max. Geschichte und kritischer Katalog des deutschen, niederlandischen und franzosischen Kupferstichs im XV. Jahrhundert. 9 vols. and 1 plate vol. Vienna: Gesellschaft fur vervielfaltigende Kunst, 1934: Vol. 9, no. 354, i/ii.

1949

  • Hollstein, F.W.H. et al. German engravings, etchings and woodcuts ca. 1400-1700. Blaricum: A.L. van Gendt B.V., 1986: Vol. XXIV, no. 354, i/ii.

1967

  • Shestack, Alan. Fifteenth Century Engravings of Northern Europe from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.. Exh. cat. Washington: National Gallery of Art, 1967: no. 215.

1993

  • Parshall, Peter. "Imago contrafacta: Images and Facts in the Northern Renaissance." Art History 16:4 (1993): 557-558, pl. 5.

Inscriptions

center, in image on altar cloth, in plate: I jehsus maria M; bottom center, in image, in plate: IVM [artist's monogram]; across bottom, in plate: Quotiens quis coram armis christi quicumque orationes apostolicas cum quicumque Pater Noster et Ave Maria devote dixerit XX milibus annorum a penis purgatorii exonoratus erit (Whoever recites in the presence of the arms of Christ the Apostle's Creed, the Pater Noster, and the Ave Maria, and as often as he does so, shall be pardoned 20,000 years of punishment in purgatory [translation from Alan Shestack, "Fifteenth Century Engravings of Northern Europe." Exh. catalogue, Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1967, no. 215.]); verso, at center, in graphite by a later hand: C 28708 / B.102; at lower left, in graphite by a later hand: Del / B.102

Markings

none

Watermarks

present on both sheets: crowned shield with two fish and two fleurs-de-lis (Lehrs 35)

Wikidata ID

Q65358481

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