CATALAN SCHOOL CIRCA 1435, - Lot 20

CATALAN SCHOOL CIRCA 1435, ENTOURAGE BY Joan MATES Christ on the Cross between the Virgin Mary and Saint John the Evangelist Pine panel, two boards, reinforced. Altarpiece panel. Egg painting and gold ground on rectangular pine panel, with semicircular arch inscribing a poly-lobed gilded wood arch. 83.5 x 48.5 cm. Bears a recent inscription on the reverse of the crosspiece: "provençal: avignon"; bears an old attribution to Enguerand Quarton. (Old restorations, lifting and missing parts). The Virgin and Saint John stand on either side of the cross of the supplicant, planted in the center of a green meadow and anchored in a solid rock. The Virgin, her face half-hidden by her ample black cloak, bows her head and spreads her arms in sorrow. Saint John, his hair short and curly, looks at Christ. He is dressed in a now-blackened blue robe, covered by a long red cape. He raises his right hand, while with the other, he holds the sacred book and a flap of his cloak. A sense of contained pain emanates from his half-open mouth and watery eyes. The crucified Christ stands upright on the cross, clad only in the perizonium covering his nakedness, his joined feet resting on the suppedaneum, pierced, like his hands, with a single black nail. From these wounds, as well as from the rib wound and the thorn-crowned head, flow copious streams of blood. With his bearded face, closed eyes and slightly open mouth revealing his teeth, he bears the stigmata of suffering. All three figures have haloed heads. This hitherto unpublished panel is probably the upper central element of an altarpiece, as evidenced by traces of old crosspieces on the reverse. It must have been made in Catalonia. The realism of the protagonists is reminiscent of that of Lluis Borrassa - active in Girona and Barcelona between 1360 and 1425 and the first representative of the International Gothic style in Spain - in his mature works, particularly illustrated by the weeping Virgin in the predella of the Manresa altarpiece (1410)[1]. As head of a large workshop, Borrassa trained assistants and disciples, among whom Joan Mates (ex-master of Peñafel), who worked mainly in Barcelona from 1391 to 1431, was one of the closest. If we compare our panel with one of Joan Mates' main altarpieces, the one dedicated to the two Saints John [2], dated circa 1420/1425, we'll note the similarities in the modenature of the arcade and the treatment of the aureoles, the shaggy appearance of the hair, the angular design of the snub-nosed faces - illustrated by the head of Saint John the Baptist presented by Salome in Herod's Feast[3] or the expressive faces of the two condemned men, who died after drinking the poisoned beverage that Saint John the Evangelist was about to drink[4]-. As for Christ, we find an exact reproduction in the predella attributed to one of Mates' followers depicting Christ at the Tomb supported by an angel (Barcelona, private collection)[5]. The lean body, gaunt musculature, deep facial features and half-open mouth are features shared by both works, suggesting the use of a common model. Situated around 1420/1430-35, this predella provides a similar dating for our panel, whose slightly later execution is by a different hand. Indeed, the linear, flowing drapery style typical of the Mates style is abandoned here in favor of greater plasticity and rigidity. [1] Cf. J. Gudiol, S. Alcolea y Blanch, Pittura Gotica Catalana, Barcelona, 1986, figs.28 and 359. [2] Altarpiece shared between the Thyssen and Carreras Mercader collections in Barcelona and the Musée de Castres, (Cf. Gudiol, Alcolea, catalog n.234, figs. 426-432 and R.Alcoy, M. Miret, Joan Mates, pintor del gotic internacional, ed. Ausa 1998, cat. 11, p. 163-174) [3] Cf. Alcoy, fig.5 and p.169 [4] Idem, fig. 8, p. 173 [5] Idem, cat. 19, p.194-195 repr).