Madonna and Child
c. 1440
Painter, Florentine, c. 1406 - 1469
West Building Main Floor, Gallery 4
Artwork overview
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Medium
tempera on poplar panel
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Credit Line
-
Dimensions
overall: 79 x 51.1 cm (31 1/8 x 20 1/8 in.)
framed: 117.2 x 85.4 x 9.5 cm (46 1/8 x 33 5/8 x 3 3/4 in.) -
Accession
1939.1.290
Artwork history & notes
Provenance
Edward Solly [1776-1844], Berlin, by 1819;[1] sold 1821 to the Königliche Museen (later Kaiser-Friedrich Museum), Gemäldegalerie, Berlin (until 1840 as no. I.165, afterward as no. 58); deaccessioned and sold 1937 to (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London, New York, and Paris);[2] sold June 1938 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[3] gift 1939 to NGA.
[1] It does not appear that the painting was ever in London, as is sometimes affirmed. In fact, it was not part of Edward Solly's second collection, put together after his move to London in 1821. His first collection was formed in Berlin, probably beginning in 1813 (see Maria Dietl, "The Picture Gallery of Berlin: The Formation of the Solly Collection," Giovanni Morelli e la cultura dei conoscitori. Atti del Convegno internazionale, Bergamo 1987, Bergamo, 1993: 49-59). Onto the back of the painting has been transferred an old label with the Prussian eagle, the letters T.N., and the number 27. This mark, whose precise meaning has not yet been clarified, is often seen on the labels attached to the backs of paintings coming from the Solly collection, and probably originated at the time of the preparation of the "Vorläufiges Verzeichnis" of 1819; see Wilhelm H. Köhler, "Die Sammlung Solly, Merkmale und Kennzeichen ihrer Bilder," in Miklós Boskovits, Gemäldegalerie Berlin. Katalog der Gemälde. Frühe italienische Malerei, Berlin, 1987: 185-186.
[2] No. 58 is cited for the last time in a publication of the Berlin museum in Irene Kunze, Staatliche Museen in Berlin. Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum. Führer durch die Gemäldegalerie. Die italienischen Meister, Berlin, 1934: 17. By the mid-1930s the Berlin museum evidently wished to acquire some German paintings that were no longer in that country. This desire was referenced in a letter written by Duveen Brothers on 26 February 1937 to the director of the paintings department at the Berlin museum, offering to him the Portrait of a Man with Lute by Hans Holbein (now no. 2154 in Berlin, then “said to be …of Jean de Dinteville,” from Henry Goldman’s collection in New York) in exchange for two paintings in Berlin, this painting and another NGA painting, Duccio's The Nativity with the Prophets Isaiah and Ezekial (NGA 1937.1.8). (Copy of the letter and an office memo in NGA curatorial files; Reel 48, Box 139, Folder 4 and Reel 189, Box 334, Folder 2, Duveen Brothers Records, accession number 960015, Research Library, The Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles.) The date of de-accession is also given by Robert Oertel, Fra Filippo Lippi, Vienna, 1942: 75.
[3] The Duveen Brothers letter confirming the sale of eight paintings, including NGA 1939.1.290, is dated 21 June 1938; the provenance is given as "The Kaiser Friedrich Museum" (copy in NGA curatorial files; Box 474, Folder 5, Duveen Brothers Records, accession number 960015, Research Library, The Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles). See also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1330.
Associated Names
Exhibition History
2013
Da Donatello a Lippi: Officina pratese, Museo Civico di Palazzo Pretorio, Prato, 2013-2014, no. 4.4, repro.
2021
The Berlin Masterpieces in America: Paintings, Politics, and the Monuments Men, Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, 2021, no. 7, repro.
Bibliography
1830
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1838
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1864
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1878
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1883
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1890
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1896
Berenson, Bernard. The Florentine Painters of the Renaissance: with an index to their works. New York, 1896: 117.
1900
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1901
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1902
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1904
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1909
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1923
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1931
Kunze, Irene, ed. Beschreibendes Verzeichnis der Gemälde im Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum, 9th ed. Berlin, 1931: 254-255.
1932
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1934
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1935
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1936
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1939
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1940
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1941
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Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1941: 107-108, no. 401.
1942
Book of Illustrations. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 247, repro. 131.
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1944
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1945
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1946
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1948
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1949
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1951
Einstein, Lewis. Looking at Italian Pictures in the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1951: 43 n. 1.
1952
Cairns, Huntington, and John Walker, eds., Great Paintings from the National Gallery of Art. New York, 1952: 18, color repro.
De Tolnay, Charles. “The Autobiographic Aspect of Fra Filippo Lippi’s Virgins.” Gazette des Beaux-Arts 39 (1952): 263.
1958
Wohl, Hellmut. “Domenico Veneziano Studies.” Ph.D. diss., New York University, Institute of Fine Arts, 1958: 231, 243.
1959
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1963
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1965
Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 76.
1966
Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XIII-XV Century. London, 1966: 106-107, fig. 289.
Cairns, Huntington, and John Walker, eds. A Pageant of Painting from the National Gallery of Art. 2 vols. New York, 1966: 1:26, color repro.
1968
National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 66, repro.
1970
Berenson, Bernard. "Fra Angelico, Fra Filippo and theri Chronology." In Bernard Berenson. Homeless Paintings of the Renaissance. Ed. Hanna Kiel. London and Bloomington, IN, 1970: 226, 228, 229. [Reprint of "Fra Angelico, Fra Filippo e la cronologia," 1936].
1972
Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, MA, 1972: 106, 646.
1973
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1975
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1979
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1980
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1982
Fusco, Laurie. “An Unpublished Madonna and Child by Fra Filippo Lippi.” J. Paul Getty Museum Journal 10 (1982): 4, 6, 8, 9, 15.
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1984
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1985
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1986
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1987
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1988
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1989
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1991
Angelelli, Walter, and Andrea G. De Marchi. Pittura dal Duecento al primo Cinquecento nelle fotografie di Girolamo Bombelli. Milan, 1991: 289, fig. XXXIII.
1993
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1996
De Marchi, Andrea. “Un raggio di luce su Filippo Lippi a Padova.” Nuovi Studi 1 (1996): 12-13, 22 n. 58.
1997
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1999
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2001
De Marchi, Andrea G. Falsi primitivi: prospettive critiche e metodi di esecuzione. Turin, 2001: 65, 89 n. 42, pl. V.
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: 401-405, color repro.
2005
Christiansen, Keith, ed. From Filippo Lippi to Piero della Francesca: Fra Carnevale and the Making of a Renaissance Master. Exh. cat. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2005: 55, 156, 166, 180.
2009
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2011
Daneo, Angelica. The Kress Collection at the Denver Art Museum. Denver, 2011: 48-49, fig. 11.
2013
Christiansen, Keith. “Filippo Lippi: “il più singolare maestro del tempo suo”.” In Andrea De Marchi and Cristina Gnoni Mavarelli, eds. Da Donatllo a Lippi: Officina pratese. Exh. cat. Museo di Palazzo Pretorio, Prato, 2013: 40.
Langhanke, Birgit. Die Madonnenreliefs im Werk von Antonio Rossellino. Ph.D. diss. Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich, 2013: 309.
2018
Galassi, Maria Clelia. "Osservazioni sulla sperimentazione tecnica di Filippo Lippi tra quarto e quinto decennio del Quattrocento." In Monica Bietta, ed. Intorno all'Annunciazione Martelli di Filippo Lippi: Riflessioni dopo il restauro. Florence, 2018: 200-201, figs. 7, 9.
Wikidata ID
Q3842474