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Painted by Nicola da Urbino

Panel with the Adoration of the Magi, c. 1525

West Building, Main Floor — Gallery 25

Medium

tin-glazed earthenware (maiolica)

Dimensions

overall: 22.2 x 16.8 cm (8 3/4 x 6 5/8 in.)
overall (thickness): 1.5 cm (9/16 in.)

Credit Line

Widener Collection

Accession Number

1942.9.341

Artists / Makers

Nicola da Urbino (ceramist) Italian, active 1520s - c. 1537/1538

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Marks and Labels

Kann collection labels 6, 204; oval Spitzer sale label; older hand-written label, reading "Page 321.No 21.B."

Provenance

Frédéric Spitzer [1815-1890], Paris; (his estate sale, at his residence by Chevallier and Mannheim, Paris, 17 April-16 June 1893, no. 1169, as Castel Durante, sold for 1,800 francs). Maurice Kann [1839-1906], Paris; purchased 1908 with the entire Kann collection by (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London, New York, and Paris); purchased February 1910 by Peter A.B. Widener, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania;[1] inheritance from the Estate of Peter A.B. Widener by gift through power of appointment of Joseph E. Widener, Elkins Park, 1942.

[1] Widener collection records in NGA curatorial files.

Associated Names

Duveen Brothers, Inc.
Kann, Maurice
Spitzer, Frédéric, Baron
Widener, Joseph E.
Widener, Peter Arrell Brown

Exhibition History

1982: Sixteenth-Century Italian Maiolica; Selections from the Arthur M. Sackler Collection and the National Gallery of Art's Widener Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1982-1983, no. 45, repro.

Technical Summary

Earthenware, covered on the front and sides and patchily on the back with a whitish, somewhat pockmarked tin glaze. The painting is in blue, green, brown, orange, yellow, gray, black, and white. A break through the Madonna's dress and the kneeling Magus has been repaired and carefully overpainted, and there is some overpaint, flaking slightly, on the edge, particularly around the lower left-hand corner.

Bibliography

1892: Molinier 1892, no. 134, as Castel Durante, c. 1540.

1935: Inventory of the Objects d'Art at Lynnewood Hall, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, The Estate of the Late P.A.B. Widener. Philadelphia, 1935: 63, as Faenza, c. 1520.

1942: Works of Art from the Widener Collection. Foreword by David Finley and John Walker. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 14, as Faenza, about 1520.

1968: Wallen, Burr. "A Majollica Panel in the Widener Collection." Report and Studies in the History of Art 2 (1968): 94-105, fig. 1.

1969: Wallen, Burr. "A Majolica Panel in the Widener Collection." Studies in the History of Art (1968-69):94-105, repro.

1983: Wilson, Carolyn C. Renaissance Small Bronze Sculpture and Associated Decorative Arts at the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1983: 120, no. 1.

1993: Distelberger, Rudolf, Alison Luchs, Philippe Verdier, and Timonthy H. Wilson. Western Decorative Arts, Part I: Medieval, Renaissance, and Historicizing Styles including Metalwork, Enamels, and Ceramics. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1993: 194-195, color repro. 194.