Overview
This small painting was probably the right-hand side of a diptych with two hinged panels. Very likely the panel opposite depicted the Virgin and Child. The man or woman who meditated on this image during private devotions would have made an intimate connection with the grief of the mourners who stood at the foot of the cross. The Gospels differ in their accounts of the Crucifixion, and so do paintings of it. Here, on the left, the swooning Virgin is accompanied by a group of holy women. One helps support her as she collapses against John the Evangelist. While they look at Mary with tender concern, all other eyes are turned toward Jesus and the angels who collect his blood. Mary Magdalene, recognized by her long flowing tresses, kneels and grasps the cross despairingly. Among the men on the right, in the armor of a Roman soldier, is the centurion who was converted on the spot, saying “Truly, this was the Son of God” (Matthew 27:54).
Small devotional works like this were a specialty of
Entry
The panel, which to judge from its proportions and rectangular shape was probably originally the right shutter of a diptych,
Mentioned only perfunctorily by art historians, but in general linked to the name of Bernardo Daddi, the painting in the National Gallery of Art was first introduced to the literature by F. Mason Perkins (1911) as a “genuine, albeit rather weak little work” of this artist.
The affinities noted by Offner between the Washington Crucifixion and the work of the Master of San Martino alla Palma are worth underlining, since they throw some light on Daddi’s beginnings and on the date of this painting. Thought in the past to be a follower of Bernardo, the Master of San Martino alla Palma is now recognized to have been at work not after, but at the same time as, Daddi’s initial phase and had probably begun his activity even earlier.
Miklós Boskovits (1935–2011)
March 21, 2016
Inscription
upper center on the tablet topping the cross: IC . XC (Jesus Christ) [1]
Inscription Notes
[1] The Greek letters are the commonly used abbreviations of IHCOYC XRICTOC, the Greek version of the name Jesus with the title Christ, literally the “Anointed One” (the translation of the Hebrew “Messiah”); Hans Feldbusch, “Christusmonogramm,” in Reallexikon zur deutschen Kunstgeschichte, edited by Otto Schmitt and Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte München, 10 vols., Stuttgart, 1937-2003: 3(1954):707-720.
Provenance
(N. van Slochem, New York) by 1908;[1] sold 1910 to Dan Fellows Platt [1873-1938], Englewood, New Jersey;[2] sold November 1943 by Trustees of the Platt Estate to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[3] gift 1961 to NGA.
Exhibition History
- 1915
- Loan Exhibition of Italian Primitive Paintings, Fogg Museum of Art, Cambridge, Massachusettes, 1915, unnumbered checklist.
- 1917
- Loan Exhibition of Italian Primitives, F. Kleinberger Galleries, New York, 1917, no. 3, repro., as Christ on the Cross by Bernardo Daddi.
- 1939
- Masterpieces of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture from 1300-1800, New York World's Fair, May-October 1939, no. 72, repro.
- 1939
- Seven Centuries of Painting: A Loan Exhibition at San Francisco, California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, December 1939-January 1940, no. 13.
- 1946
- Recent Additions to the Kress Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1946, no. 795.
Technical Summary
The support is a single wooden panel
The support has been damaged by woodworm in the past, as is apparent in the
Bibliography
- 1911
- Perkins, F. Mason. "Dipinti italiani nella raccolta Platt." Rassegna d’Arte 11 (1911): 1.
- 1914
- Brown, Alice van Vechten, and William Rankin. A Short History of Italian Painting. London and New York, 1914: 65 n. 3.
- 1914
- Sirén, Osvald. "Pictures in America by Bernardo Daddi, Taddeo Gaddi, Andrea Orcagna and His Brothers, I." Art in America 2 (1914): 264.
- 1915
- Edgell, George Harold. "The Loan Exhibitiion of Italian Paintings in the Fogg Museum, Cambridge." Art and Archaeology II, no. 1 (July 1915): 13.
- 1917
- Sirén, Osvald. Giotto and Some of His Followers. 2 vols. Translated by Frederic Schenck. Cambridge, 1917: 1:168, 270; 2:pl. 147.
- 1918
- Gilman, Margaret. "A Triptych by Bernardo Daddi." Art in America (1918): 213.
- 1919
- Offner, Richard. "Italian Pictures at the New York Historical Society and Elsewhere." Art in America 7 (1919): 149.
- 1923
- Marle, Raimond van. The Development of the Italian Schools of Painting. 19 vols. The Hague, 1923-1938: 3(1924):378.
- 1928
- Comstock, Helen. "The Bernardo Daddis in the United States." International Studio 38 (1928): 21.
- 1930
- Offner, Richard. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. The Fourteenth Century. Sec. III, Vol. III: The Works of Bernardo Daddi. New York, 1930: 5.
- 1931
- Venturi, Lionello. Pitture italiane in America. Milan, 1931: no. 35, repro.
- 1932
- Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: A List of the Principal Artists and Their Works with an Index of Places. Oxford, 1932: 165.
- 1933
- Venturi, Lionello. Italian Paintings in America. Translated by Countess Vanden Heuvel and Charles Marriott. 3 vols. New York and Milan, 1933: 1:no. 44, repro.
- 1936
- Berenson, Bernard. Pitture italiane del rinascimento: catalogo dei principali artisti e delle loro opere con un indice dei luoghi. Translated by Emilio Cecchi. Milan, 1936: 142.
- 1939
- Valentiner, Wilhelm R., and Alfred M. Frankfurter. Masterpieces of Art. Exhibition at the New York World’s Fair, 1939. Official Souvenir Guide and Picture Book. New York, 1939: no. 32.
- 1944
- Frankfurter, Alfred M. The Kress Collection in the National Gallery. New York, 1944: 15, repro., as by the Riminese Master.
- 1945
- Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1945 (reprinted 1947, 1949): 12, repro., as by Bernardo Daddi.
- 1946
- Frankfurter, Alfred M. Supplement to the Kress Collection in the National Gallery. New York, 1946: 21, repro.
- 1951
- Einstein, Lewis. Looking at Italian Pictures in the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1951: 23.
- 1958
- Offner, Richard. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. The Fourteenth Century. Sec. III, Vol. VIII: Workshop of Bernardo Daddi. New York, 1958: 142-143, pl. 38.
- 1959
- Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 20, repro., as by Bernardo Daddi.
- 1963
- Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Florentine School. 2 vols. London, 1963: 1:58.
- 1965
- Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 36.
- 1966
- Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XIII-XV Century. London, 1966: 25-27, fig. 69.
- 1967
- Kermer, Wolfgang. "Studien zum Diptych in der sakralen Malerei von den Anfängen bis zur Mitte des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts." 2 vols. Ph.D. dissertation, Eberhardt-Karls-Universität, Tübingen, 1967: 1:255 n. 48.
- 1968
- National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 29, repro.
- 1972
- Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972: 63, 290, 646, 665.
- 1975
- European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 90, repro.
- 1979
- Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. National Gallery of Art. 2 vols. Washington, 1979: 1:154-155; 2:pl. 109.
- 1984
- Boskovits, Miklós. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. The Fourteenth Century. Sec. III, Vol. 9: The Miniaturist Tendency. Florence, 1984: 67 n. 246.
- 1985
- European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 111, repro.
- 1989
- Offner, Richard, Miklós Boskovits, and Enrica Neri Lusanna. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. The Fourteenth Century. Sec. III, Vol. III: The Works of Bernardo Daddi. 2nd ed. Florence, 1989: 67, 391.
- 2001
- Offner, Richard, Miklós Boskovits, Ada Labriola, and Martina Ingendaay Rodio. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. The Fourteenth Century. Sec. III, Vol. V: Master of San Martino alla Palma; Assistant of Daddi; Master of the Fabriano Altarpiece. 2nd ed. Florence, 2001: 13 n. 22, 635.
- 2008
- Skaug, Erling S. "Bernardo Daddi’s Chronology and Workshop Structure as Defined by Technical Criteria." In Da Giotto a Botticelli: pittura fiorentina tra gotico e rinascimento. Atti del convegno internazionale Firenze, Università degli Studi e Museo di San Marco, May 20-21, 2005. Edited by Francesca Pasut and Johannes Tripps. Florence, 2008: 79-96.
- 2016
- Boskovits, Miklós. Italian Paintings of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries. The Systematic Catalogue of the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 2016: 58-63, color repro.