Lot n° 263
Estimation :
20000 - 30000
EUR
Result with fees
Result
: 23 184EUR
Hans Süss von KULMBACH (Kulmbach vers 1485 - Nuremberg 1522) - Lot 263
Hans Süss von KULMBACH (Kulmbach vers 1485 - Nuremberg 1522)
The Virgin of the Annunciation, ca. 1511
Pen and brown and black ink, gray wash 18.2 cm in tondo the sheet; 17.9 cm the drawn part
Annotated "resembles the Madonna of Durer at the Albertina".
Some stains, glue spots on the edges
Provenance:
Former collection of Prince Nikolaus Esterhazy (1765-1833), his stamp at lower right (L.1965)
Our unpublished drawing is a counterpart to the Angel of the Annunciation (ca. 1511), another tondo from the collection of Prince Esterhazy in the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest (see Barbara Butts, The drawings of Hans Süss von Kulmbach, Master Drawings, volume XLIV, no. 2, 2006, no. A40, repr. p.170 Friedrich Winkler, Die Zeichnungen von Kulmbachs und Hans Leonard Schäufeleins, Berlin, 1942, ed. Deutscher Verein für Kunstwissenschaft, n118, repr.). The two drawings (of the same dimensions) are linked by the same window frame overlooking a landscape.
These two stained glass designs must have been kept together in the famous collection at least until 1843; a small part of the collection was offered for sale on May 26, 1843 at Phillips in London. Esterhazy's collection, formed in the early nineteenth century, contains very important sixteenth-century German and Italian drawings. In 1804 he bought a set from the German dealer J.F. Frauenholz from Paulus II Praun (1548?-1616), a silk merchant from Nüremberg.
The two drawings served as models for stained glass windows made by the Hirschvogel workshop, examples of which are known to be in the Erbach Castle in Germany (see Szilvia Bodnar, German drawings of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries in the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest, 2020, pp. 313-314, the stained glass window of the Angel of the Annunciation reproduced in fig. 313a). In her note, she points out that Uwe Gast hesitates between the attribution to Kulmbach or the workshop of Hirschvogel (see Uwe Gast, Die mittelalterlichen Glasmalerein in Oppenheim, Rhein und Südhessen, Berlin, 2011, Deutsche Verlag).
The stylistic characteristics of Kulmbach's drawings for the glass masters are present, such as the synthesizing accents on the faces, the curls in the hair, the deformed hands, the gray brush wash in parallel strokes, the safety pins in the draperies. The same lectern base appears on a design for a stained glass window depicting Saint Augustine (Butts, no. A43, Winkler, no. 104). Mrs. Bodnar compares the technique of the Budapest design to those of Dresden (Dresden, Kupferstich-Kabinett, inv. No. C2189-C2190-C2192; reprinted in B. Butts, nos. 41-43, figs. 75-77).
The synthetic technique of the designs for Kulmbach's stained glass windows is the same as that of Albrecht Dürer (Barbara Butts returned two designs formerly attributed to Kulmbach to Dürer).
Kulmbach was probably a student of Jacopo de Barbari between 1500 and 1503, during the latter's stay in Nuremberg. Kulmbach joined Dürer's workshop around 1507 and soon became his principal assistant, coinciding with the departures of Schäufelein and Baldung. A large number of stained glass projects are recorded around 1510, just before he became a citizen of Nuremberg in 1511 and set up his own business. From then on he was one of the most important German altarpiece painters, succeeding Dürer's teacher in this position, Michael Wolgemut. Kulmbach gained independent stature with his masterpiece, the Tucher triptych (1513) in the church of St. Sebaldus in Nuremberg. The friendly relationship with Dürer continued, since it was the Master who provided him with the drawing in 1511.
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