Follower of Hieronymous Bosch

Acquired by Baron Coppée by 1923;¹

Thence by descent.

Tokyo, Tobu Museum of Art, The World of Bruegel. The Coppée Collection and Eleven International Museums, 29 March – 25 June 1995, no. F14 (as Circle of Jan de Cock).

S. Leclercq, et al., La Collection Coppée, Liège1991, pp. 28–29 reproduced;

M. Wilmotte, in the catalogue of the exhibition The World of Bruegel. The Coppée Collection and Eleven International Museums, Tokyo 1995, p.181, no. F14, reproduced.

The following condition report is provided by Hamish Dewar who is an external specialist and not an employee of Sotheby's: Structural Condition The panel has been cradled and this is has successfully ensured a sound structural support and has secured the join or split which runs horizontally across the centre of the panel. No further structural intervention is required. Paint Surface The paint surface has a reasonably even but undoubtedly discoloured varnish layer and should respond very well to cleaning and revarnishing. Inspection under ultra-violet light confirms how discoloured the varnish layers have become and also shows small discoloured retouchings. The most significant of these are: 1) a horizontal line along the repaired join or split running across the centre of the composition, 2) retouchings around the framing edges and particularly along the left vertical framing edge, 3) small, scattered spots in the clouds and sky, and 4) a small area, approximately 1 cm in diameter in the pink pigments of the 'feathers' in the centre of the composition and very small spots on the pink dress of the woman in the lower right of the composition. There may be other retouchings beneath the disoloured varnish layers which are not identifiable under ultra-violet light but it is very encouraging to note that the fine details of the painting appear to be intact and well preserved with little evidence of wear or abrasion. Summary The painting would therefore appear to be in essentially very good and stable condition and should respond well to cleaning, restoration and revarnishing.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

In a fantastic rocky landscape teeming with a demonic rabble, the hermit Saint Anthony is meditating on the Holy Scriptures. He is identified by his companion pig and the 'tau' (Greek letter T) emblem on his cape, the symbol of the Antonine Order that bears his name. His struggles with his ascetic spirituality are here depicted in the traditional Christian forms of attacks both by demons and erotic visions. The former take the form of grylles or two-legged demons, and the latter the elegant young woman who rises from the river and offers him a cup, symbolic of lust.² Behind him stands a hollow tree, the medieval symbol of the seat of evil-doing or alchemy. At the top of this is a tent, inside which quasi-religious figures such as a monk vomit or handle a vase, symbolising the sins of gluttony and lust.³ The significance of the curious apparition in the foreground, in which a feathered tent is surmounted by a palisade and fronted by an ornate scythed shield is less clear and may simply be fantastical. In the background we see Saint Anthony again, this time beset by two demons, who drag him towards a curious egg-shaped structure.

There is no doubt that the principal inspiration behind this lively panel was the work of the Flemish painter Hieronymus Bosch (1453–1516), who was the first to explore the theme of the hermit saints in such vivid pictorial terms. This panel has been associated in the past with the work of two of Bosch's principal followers, Jan Mandijn (circa 1500–60) and Pieter Huys (1519–84), but an attribution to neither seems very plausible. Huys' earliest work, another Temptation of Saint Anthony of 1547 in the Louvre, is of an altogether more articulate and restrained form of mannerism. Mandijn's only signed work, a Temptation of St. Anthony in the Frans Hals Museum in Haarlem is perhaps closer in concept, but much freer in execution and style. Another closely related version of this composition, formerly with Leger in London and later Silberman in Vienna, which shows some differences in the physiognomy of the saint and some of the flying creatures, has also been ascribed in the past to both artists, but is now more generally perceived to be the work of an as yet unidentified follower of Bosch.⁴ At the time of the Tokyo exhibition Wilmotte advanced the suggestion that the Coppée panel may be connected to the work of the Leiden born painter Jan Wellens de Cock (circa 1490–1521). A panel of the Temptation of Saint Anthony in the California Palace of the Legion of Honour, often ascribed to his hand, for example, does have some parallels with the present panel.⁵  Cock's work is, however, probably too early in date for the authorship of this panel, for he is thought to have died in 1521, and the panel here certainly lacks the freely expressed paintwork of the few works given to his hand, such as the Saint Christopher sold in these Rooms, 8 December 2004, lot 7.  

 

 

 

 

1. According to Leclercq, op. cit., 1991, the Coppée archives held a certificate from J. Destrée and J. Decoen, dated 5 December 1923 (as by Pieter Huys), thus providing a terminus ante quem for the purchase of the painting.

2. The episode is described in the Vitae Patrum or Lives of the Desert Fathers. Réau (Iconographie de l'art chrétien, 1955–1959), identified this figure as analogous to the Whore of Babylon.

3. The tent may be derived from Bosch himself, for it appears, for example, in the right wing of his Last Judgement triptych in Vienna, as a dwelling place of Satan.   

4. Panel, 55 x 65 cm. RKD no. 51888.

5. Exhibited, Brussels, De eeuw van Brueghel, 1963, no. 72.