ADRIAEN ISENBRANT | The Virgin and Child enthroned with Angels before a landscape

Acquired by the late husband of the present owner on the London art market.

C. Peuckert, in E. Mai (ed.), Das Kabinett des Sammlers, Cologne 1993, pp. 25–27, no. 11, reproduced.

The following condition report is provided by Henry Gentle who is an external specialist and not an employee of Sotheby's. The panel is well preserved and the paint layer is flat and stable. A recent 'artistic' clean has been undertaken. The Madonna's face and hands, the child, the putti and the sky have all been cleaned, the remaining paint to the Madonna's robes, columns and foreground still retain a discoloured and degraded varnish. There is some slight natural thinning of the paint layer in the Madonna's blue dress and to the houses in the background. Under U-V light recent re-touchings can be seen on the Madonna's face and hands, to reduce minor loss and dark shrinkage cracks, and to the fingers of the putto at the lower right. The removal of the remaining varnish will improve the tonality and reveal paint in a good state of preservation with many fine details intact.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

Characteristic of Isenbrant in this work, probably the central panel of a dismembered small portable altar made for private devotion, is the soft-focus sfumato technique and the high forehead of the Virgin. Many of Isenbrant's paintings have a compositional prototype in the work of an earlier artist, and this example is no exception, being adapted from several early works by Jan Gossaert, most notably the Malvagna triptych of circa 1513–15, executed in collaboration with Gerard David, another artist on whose style Isenbrant formed his.¹ Closer still are other works by Isenbrant himself, including another Malvagna triptych derivation, also a triptych, formerly in the Von Pannwitz collection, Heemstede, in which the Christ-Child also reaches out to a parrot borne aloft by a Cherub.²  The closest work to the present one however is the Virgin and Child with Angels in the San Diego Museum of Art, of which this is a variant.³  Infra-red imaging conducted by Tager Stonor Richardson reveals pouncing throughout the composition of the figures and the throne in the present work, with linear dry medium underdrawing limited to the architecture in the background and indications of landscape.⁴  It is possible that both this and the San Diego picture derive from the same cartoon, although the San Diego picture is larger overall, being extended a little at the sides and a lot at the square top.  Moreover, the underdrawing of the building with a pitched roof and sloping gables in the present work reveals a stepped gable, as found in the San Diego picture. 

1 See M.W. Ainsworth, in M.W. Ainsworth (ed.), Jan Gossaert's Renaissance. The Complete Works, exh. cat., New Haven and London 2010, pp. 131–39, cat. no. 6, reproduced.

2 See M.J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish Painting, vol. XI, Leiden 1974, p. 81, no. 143, reproduced plate 112.

3 Oil on panel, 24.13 x 19.05 cm.; See A. Mongan & E. Mongan. European Paintings in The Timken Art Gallery, San Diego 1969. pp. 52-3, 116, no. 17, reproduced, & online catalogue http://collection.sdmart.org/Obj1012?sid=11956&x=172873, where dated circa 1510-20.

4 Job no. 20181017, 17th October 2018.  Their report is available on request and will be posted online.