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Workshop of Alejo Fernández (Germany?, circa 1470 - Seville,…
Workshop of Alejo Fernández (Germany?, circa 1470 - Seville,…
Lot no. 22
Description
Workshop of Alejo Fernández (Germany?, circa 1470 - Seville, 1545). Following models by Pieter Coecke van Aelst (Aelst, 1502 - Brussels, 1550)
'The Adoration of the Magi'
Oil on pine wood panel.
212 x 113 cm.
Beautiful large-format painting of the Adoration of the Magi, depicting the arrival of the Three Wise Men to worship the Christ Child. Each king represents a continent and offers a symbolic gift, alluding to the triple nature of Jesus: Melchior offers gold (as a king); Gaspar offers incense (as God); and Balthazar offers myrrh (as man).
The scene is a spectacle of luxury and power, with rich garments, jewels, and classical architecture from which onlookers gaze upon the main event. A vertical axis runs through the compositionfrom the light breaking through the heavens to the Child who receives it and radiates it in blessing, revealing who is the true center of the work.
A simple yet deeply moving composition, it portrays the meeting of two worlds: the new one, emerging with the birth of Christ, and the old one, represented by the kings, the architecture, and the preexisting landscape in the background.
Attached is the conservation report from I.C.R. (Investigación, Conservación, Restauración de obras de arte) (Research, Conservation, and Restoration of Works of Art), which details its formal characteristics, as well as the hypothesis of authorship and its state of conservation. This report serves as the basis for the present cataloging.
Regarding the school to which our panel belongs, the report attributes the piece to the workshop of the master Alejo Fernández, “German by birth, who settled in Córdoba in 1496 and shortly afterward moved to Seville, where he worked until his death in 1546.” According to the report, our work “could very well have come from his workshop or his closest circle, as it is very close in concept to his production, especially in terms of composition and scenography.” In fact, “the great success his works achieved led to the development of a large workshop [...] within which, without a doubt, the piece in question was produced.” This workshop and other collaborators of the painter, who were particularly active after 1520 due to “the great demand from the American market [and] the economic prosperity of Seville,” perhaps did not possess Alejo’s extreme mastery but undoubtedly “created works of great beauty and quality that achieved wide circulation,” among which ours is included.
They justify this as follows: “The most specific characteristics of this work that essentially agree with Fernández’s are the nocturnal sky, the clouds opening, the star cut out against the background, the figure of the camel, the composition and distribution of the groups, and finally, the arrangement of the architecture as in a stage setting.”
Thus, despite the undeniable Flemish — and Italian, “in its calm and serene nature” — influences, the author would not belong to the Flemish school, among other reasons because the work is executed on pinewood and “Flemish masters, even when working abroad, rarely abandoned oak as a support.”
Nevertheless, the report notes “the great compositional and stylistic similarity with the work of Pieter Coecke van Aelst (1502–1550), court painter to Emperor Charles V, which relates this work [ours] to the Epiphany Triptych published by Llompart from the Zaforteza Collection (Mallorca) (Vol. III, p. 129, no. 182).” They also highlight the resemblance in scenography, which is “practically identical to a work by Bernaert van Orley (master of Coecke), a Virgin and Child located in the Prado Museum.”
For all these reasons, we include this “Epiphany” within the workshop of Alejo Fernández, following models by Pieter Coecke van Aelst.
Regarding the formal and compositional characteristics of the panel, “currently detached, it once formed part of a large altarpiece; it depicts the Adoration of the Magi with all its proper iconographic elements (the Holy Family, the three Magi with their gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh, and the Star of Bethlehem). The scene is framed within an interior opening to an idealized landscape; on the left side of the composition, a curtain, wall, and column frame the Holy Family, arranged in a perfect diagonal, while the group of the three kings is juxtaposed in the open space. Some figures observe the scene from atop the wall, and in the background, a crowd and an (idealized) camel are seen departing through the gates of a walled city, with a mountainous landscape featuring a river and a bridge crossing it. The Star of Bethlehem shines on the left side of the composition against a nocturnal, stormy sky.
The clothing of all the figures is entirely Renaissance, as are the objects accompanying them; the only late Gothic remnants can be found in the halos of Saint Joseph, the Virgin, and the Child, which are completely flat and gilded with gold leaf.
Each figure, each face is entirely individualized, clearly showing the influence of Flemish portraiture.”
To conclude, we add brief information about the iconography of the panel. The Kings are known in the Christian religion as the Magi, figures who appear in a very concise account in the Gospel of Matthew (Mt 2:1–12), although the evangelist does not mention their names. It was through the apocryphal gospels that details were gradually added to this story, which the Church would later accept (the number of three Kings was officially adopted by ecclesiastical doctrine under Pope Leo I, who affirmed it in the 4th century in his 'Sermons for the Epiphany'), and which artists would then incorporate into their works.
Throughout the Middle Ages, stories began to circulate speculating about who exactly the three famous Kings who visited the Christ Child were. Many supposed that they came from somewhere in the East. Eventually, it was decided that the three Kings would represent the three principal continents of the time: Europe, Asia, and Africa. The three names that prevailed over the centuries were King Gaspar (or Caspar), King Melchior, and King Balthazar. The prominence of this story of the Three Wise Men is due to the deep theological meaning contained in the biblical account, to their exotic garments and appearance, and to the grandeur and costliness of their gifts.
According to the ecclesiastical calendar, the event depicted is celebrated in Western Christianity as the Feast of the Epiphany (January 5); in the Eastern Orthodox Church, it is celebrated as the Adoration of the Magi (December 25). The term we have used as the title of this work is an anglicized form from the Vulgate, from the Latin section of this passage: 'A MAGIS ADORATUR'.
Provenance:
- Bendinat Castle Auction at Christie’s.
- Mallorcan antique dealer.
- Private Collection. Mallorca.
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