FOLLOWER OF SIR PETER PAUL RUBENS | SAINT ILDEFONSO RECEIVING THE CHASUBLE FROM THE VIRGIN

Anonymous sale, Munich, Hugo Helbing, 17-19 March 1921, lot 714 (as Rubens School);

Private collection, Sweden, by the 1930s;

Thence by descent to the present owner. 

H. Vlieghe, Corpus Rubenianum, Ludwig Burchard: Saints, part VIII, London 1972-1973, vol. II, pp. 82-84, under cat. no. 117 (as a copy). 

This large canvas is a faithful, reduced copy of the central panel of Sir Peter Paul Rubens' Ildefonso Altarpiece, which was originally donated by Isabella Clara Eugenia to the Brotherhood of Saint Ildefonso in Brussels but is today in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.¹  The subject illustrates a legend from the life of Saint Ildefonso, a Spanish scholar and monk. In the last decade of his life, while serving as the Bishop of Toledo, the Virgin came to him in a miraculous vision and gifted to him, in recognition of his devotion, an ornate chasuble or vestment, to wear during Marian celebrations.  

1. Inv. no. 678, oil on panel, central panel: 352 by 236 cm. https://www.khm.at/objektdb/detail/2656/