Walter Pompe

Private collection, France, and by descent until 2019

This finely carved Cristo Vivo is carved by the well known Baroque sculptor Walter Pompe. Pompe received important public commissions, including monumental sculpture for the Cathedral of Antwerp, but also made smaller scale sculpture for the private market. Several of his works are in significant public collections, including in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, and in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts, in Pompe's hometown, Antwerp.

Pompe's Cristo Vivo was sought after and several examples, in both wood and ivory, were acquired by private collectors, churches, and monasteries (op. cit.). An unsigned Cristo Vivo attributed to Pompe is now in the Philadelphia Museum of Art (inv. no. 2015-188-1). Another boxwood Crucifix, dated 1730, was offered in these rooms, 5 December 2012, lot 75.

RELATED LITERATURE

P. Jozef Visschers, Walther Pompe en zyne twee zonen Pauwel en Engelbert, beeldhouwers der XVIIIe eeuw, Antwerp, 1858