MASTER OF THE LITTLE COLOGNE PASSION | The Crucifixion, with the Virgin, Saint John the Evangelist, Saint Augustine, a bishop, and two nuns

The eponymous work, the outer wings of a triptych depicting a Passion cycle, is today in the Wallraf-Richartz Museum (inv. no. WRM 0038),(1) and includes a scene depicting the Crucifixion very similar to the present painting. This painting probably also originally formed part of a series depicting scenes from the Passion – however each scene would have been painted as framed pictures on a single specially prepared canvas, also known as Tüchlein, rather than in the context of an altarpiece – this was a genre that found particular popularity in Cologne, and of which few examples survive. Such series are ultimately of Byzantine origin in conception and may have served in Cologne as teaching tools or for private contemplation.

We are grateful to Dr Roland Krischel for his assistance in the cataloguing of this lot.

1 B. Corley, Painting and Patronage in Colonge. 1300-1500, London 2000, p. 113, reproduced fig. 86.