Follower of Gerard David

With Harris, London, by 1920;
With Leo Blumenreich (1884-1932), Berlin;
With P. & D. Colnaghi & Co. Ltd., London from 1947-49;
With Thomas Agnew & Sons, London, by 1953;
With Kunsthandel  P. de Boer, Amsterdam, by 1959;
Private collection, the Netherlands, by 1961.

London, P. & D., Colnaghi & Co. Ltd, Paintings by Old Masters, November - December 1947 (as Adriaen Isenbrant);
Bruges, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Gerard David,  18 June - 21 August 1949,  p. 52, no. 35  (as Adriaen Isenbrant, ca. 1530);
London, Wildenstein Gallery, Gerard David and his followers, 1949,  p. 16, no. 22  (as Adriaen Isenbrant, ca. 1530);
Laren, Singer Museum, Nederlandse primitieven uit Nederlands particulier bezit, 1 July - 10 September 1961, p. 13, no. 45, plate 17  (as Adriaen Isenbrant).

J.G. van Gelder, 'The Gerard David Exhibition at Bruges' in The Burlington Magazine, vol. 91, 1949, p. 253-254, reproduced plate 19 (as Adriaen Isenbrant).

The support consists of a single, stable panel, bevelled on the bottom and right edges. The paint surface is secure and generally in good condition under a dirty varnish. It has somewhat abraded in the darks of St. John’s robes and in the darker patches of the clouds. Some discoloured retouching work is evident in these areas, as well as in the flesh tones of Christ and outlining the river bank. This is confirmed under UV light which also reveals an old area of damage/retouching centre left in the palest part of the sky. Offered in a wooden frame with a red velvet inset in fair condition.
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At the time of the Colnaghi and Bruges exhibitions in the 1940s this painting was attributed to Adriaen Isenbrandt and dated to circa 1530.  However the recent dendrochronology report gives 1508 as the earliest likely date of use for the panel and therefore an earlier date of execution is likely. Stylistically the composition is closer to the work of Gerard David than that of Adriaen Isenbrandt, his principal follower. The painter may perhaps have been aware of David’s altarpiece of The Baptism of Christ painted in the first decade of the 16^th century for Jan de Trompes and today in the Groeningemuseum, Bruges.¹  In the present painting the artist has followed David’s design of St. John baptising Christ in the foreground, with the narrative of St. John in the trees behind and the figure of God in the clouds above.

1. H.J. van Miergroet, Gerard David, Antwerp 1989, pp. 186, 292-3, no. 23, reproduced in colour fig. 176.