Skip to Main Content
Home>Collection>Saint Mary Salome and Her Family

Overview

Saint Mary Salome and Her Family together with its companion piece Saint Mary Cleophas and Her Family, also in the National Gallery, were wings from an altarpiece combining painting and sculpture that was dedicated to the Holy Kinship or extended family of Christ. There was a fascination with the details of the life of the Holy Family as well as a growing desire to experience the Gospels on a human level in the late Middle Ages. According to the Golden Legend, written about 1270 as a compilation of earlier tales, Saint Anne married three times, her third husband being the father of Mary Salome, who was thus the half-sister of the Virgin Mary.

Strigel, who worked in Memmingen, a small city in the southern German province of Bavaria, makes Mary Salome the center of a comfortable domestic scene. Her father Salomas, wearing characteristic Jewish headgear, hovers behind her, while her husband Zebedee sits beside her. Their two small sons James and John are identifiable by the names inscribed on their halos. They will grow up to be disciples of Christ, and indeed Saint John is already busy writing a book in Hebrew like characters, foretelling his future activity as one of the four authors of the Gospels.

More information on this painting can be found in the Gallery publication German Paintings of the Fifteenth through Seventeenth Centuries, which is available as a free PDF https://www.nga.gov/content/dam/ngaweb/research/publications/pdfs/german-painting-fifteenth-through-seventeenth-centuries.pdf

Inscription

on halo of female figure: SANCTA MARIA SALOME; on halo of child at cetner: SANCTVS IACOBVS MA; on halo of child at lower left: SANCTV IOHANES EWAN

Provenance

Possibly O. Streber, Munich.[1] (Haskard Bank, Florence, and Charles Fairfax Murray, as agent, by 1900);[2] sold 1900 to (Thomas Agnew & Sons, Ltd., London); sold May 1900 to Rodolphe Kann [d. 1905], Paris;[3] by descent to executors of the Kann estate: Edouard Kann, Paris; Betty Schnaffer [née Kann], Frankfurt; Martin and Eleanore [née Kann] Bromberg, Hamburg; Jacob and Mathilde [née Kann] Emden, Hamburg, and Edmond and Madeline [née Kann] Bickard See, Paris.[4] (Duveen Brothers, Paris, August, 1907);[5] purchased August 1907 by members of the Kann family, possibly Martin and Eleanore Bromberg, Hamburg.[6] Probably Dr. Max Emden, Switzerland, by 1939.[7] (Wildenstein & Co., New York, by 1939);[8] purchased February 1954 by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[9] at the NGA from 1956; gift 1961 to NGA.

[1] Unverified, cited by Alfred Stange, Kritisches Verzeichnis der deutschen Tafelbelder vor Dürer. 3 vols. (Munich, 1970), 2: 204, no. 899.

[2] Letter of 24 January 1969, from Richard Kingzett, Thos. Agnew & Sons, Ltd., London, to Colin Eisler, in NGA curatorial files.

[3] Kingzett letter of 24 January 1969 cited above.

[4] Duveen stockbook in archives at the Metropolitan Musuem of Art, New York; see letter of 23 February 1987 from Guy Bauman, Department of European Paintings to John Hand in NGA curatorial files.

[5] Guy Bauman letter cited above and Edward Fowles, Memories of Duveen Brothers (London, 1976), 36-43.

[6] Bauman letter, cited in note 4, notes that in both the stockbook and the salesbook, the paintings are listed only as having been sold to "Kann relations."

[7] Wildenstein & Co. brochure in NGA Kress files lists Bromberg and Dr. Emden as previous owners.

[8] Letter of 14 September 1988 from Ay-Whang Hsia, Wildenstein & Co., to John Hand, in NGA curatorial files.

[9] William E. Suida, Paintings and Sculpture of the Samuel H. Kress Collection. (Denver, 1954), 64, no. 28; letter of 10 November 1987 to John Hand from Louise H. Kliopov, Denver Art Museum, in NGA curatorial files (see also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1875). Eisler 1977, 26, reversed the exhibition dates for this and the Saint Mary Salome and Her Family also by Strigel.
The bill of sale (copy in NGA curatorial files) is dated February 10, 1954, and was for a total of fourteen paintings; payments by the Foundation continued to March 1957.

Exhibition History

1940
Seventh Anniversary Exhibition of German, Flemish, and Dutch Painting, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art -- Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, 1940-1941, no. 57, as The Virgin Instructing the Infant.
1950
Holbein and His Contemporaries, John Herron Art Museum, Indianapolis, 1950, no. 68.

Technical Summary

The painting is on a fir panel apparently composed of two boards with vertical grain,[1] although numerous cracks make it difficult to determine the number of joins. In 1947 the panel was thinned, marouflaged to mahogany, and cradled. As with the pendant, the ground is rather thick and the bole under the gilding is reddish in tone. The same extensive underdrawing is revealed under examination with infrared reflectography; changes in the eye and thumb of the man to the right of Mary Salome are visible.

The picture is basically in good condition. There is a certain amount of worm tunneling, visible at the edges of the panel. The paint layer is in generally good condition; retouching is confined to the edges, the joins, and the numerous vertical cracks in the bottom third of the painting.

[1] The wood was identified as fir by Michael Palmer, National Gallery's scientific research department; Eisler 1977 listed the support of this painting and 1961.9.89 as linden.

Bibliography

1907
Baum, Julius. "Strigel." In Thieme-Becker. 37 vols. Leipzig, 1907-1950: 32(1938):189.
1907
Bode, Wilhelm von. Catalogue of the Rodolphe Kann Collection. 2 vols. Paris, 1907: 2:nos. 115-116, repro.
1914
Weizinger, Franz Xavier. "Die Maler-Familie der 'Strigel' in der ehemals freien Reichsstadt Memmingen." Festschrift des Münchener Altertums-verein zur Erinnerung an das 50. Jahr Jubiläum. 1914: 143, no. 31.
1928
Weizinger, Franz Xavier. "Bernhard Strigel 1460-1528." Memminger Geschichts-Blätter 14(June 1928): 10.
1934
Stange, Alfred. Deutsche Malerei der Gotik. 11 vols. Berlin and Munich, 1934-1961. Munich, 1957: 8:144, fig. 299.
1951
Otto, Gertrud. "Zwei Sippenbilder von Bernhard Strigel." Memminger Geschichts-Blätter, 1951: 1-2.
1954
Suida, William E. Paintings and Sculpture of the Samuel H. Kress Collection. Denver, 1954: 64, no. 28, repro.
1955
Bach, Otto Karl, et al. "European Art. The Denver Art Museum Winter Collection." Denver Art Museum Quarterly (1955): 15, no. 31, repro. 14.
1956
Frankfurter, Alfred. "Crystal Anniversary in the Capital." Art News 55, no. 1 (March 1956): 26, repro.
1956
Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection Acquired by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation 1951-56. Introduction by John Walker, text by William E. Suida and Fern Rusk Shapley. National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1956: 172, no. 68, repro.
1959
Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 313, repro.
1959
Rettich, Edeltraud. "Bernhard Strigel. Ergänzungen und Berichtigungen zu: Alfred Stange `Deutsche Malerei der Gotik, VIII. Band, Schwaben'." Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 22 (1959): 163-165.
1960
Broadley Hugh T. German Painting in the National Gallery of Art (Booklet no. 9 in Ten Schools of Painting in the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC). Washington, 1960: 9, 34-35, color repro.
1964
Otto, Gertrud. Bernhard Strigel. Munich and Berlin, 1964: 48, 50-51, 98, no. 38 a, b, repro. 47, 49 (color), figs. 94-95.
1965
Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 125.
1967
Stange, Alfred. Kritisches Verzeichnis der deutschen Tafelbilder vor Dürer. 3 vols. Munich, 1970: 2:204, no. 899 a, b.
1968
Musper, Heinrich Theodor. "Strigel, Bernhard." Kindlers Malerei Lexikon, edited by Germain Bazin, et al. 6 vols. Zürich, 1964-1971. Zürich, 1968: 5:436.
1968
National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 112, repro.
1975
European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 334, repro.
1975
Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. New York, 1975: 151 nos. 161, 162, repro. 150.
1977
Eisler, Colin. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: European Schools Excluding Italian. Oxford, 1977: 26-28, fig. 19.
1980
Thümmel, Hans Georg. "Bernhard Strigels Diptychon für Cuspinian." Jahrbuch der kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien 76 (1980): 108, n. 36.
1983
Wolff, Martha. German Art of the Late Middle Ages and Renaissance in the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 1983: unpaginated, repro.
1984
Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 151, no. 156, color repro.
1985
European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 383, repro.
1989
Michaelis, Rainer. Deutsche Gemälde 14. -18. Jahrhundert Staatliche Museen Berlin. Gemäldegalerie. Katalog Band III. Berlin, 1989: 110.
1992
National Gallery of Art, Washington. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1992: 62, repro.
1993
Hand, John Oliver, with the assistance of Sally E. Mansfield. German Paintings of the Fifteenth through Seventeenth Centuries. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, 1993: 176-180, color repro. 175.
1995
Löcher, Kurt. Review of German Paintings of the Fifteenth through Seventeenth Centuries, by John Oliver Hand with the assistance of Sally E. Mansfield. Kunstchronik 43 no. 1 (January 1995): 19-20.
2004
Hand, John Oliver. National Gallery of Art: Master Paintings from the Collection. Washington and New York, 2004: 140, no. 109, color repro.

Related Content

  • Sort by:
  • Results layout:
Show  results per page
The image compare list is empty.