- Museum number
- SL,5218.85
- Description
-
Martyrdom of St Stephen; kneeling figure of the saint turned to right, his hands clasped together, three men around him picking up stones and throwing them at him, scattered stones in the foreground, a large rock with trees behind and buildings in the distance to right
Pen and black and brown ink, with brown wash (probably added by a later hand), heightened with white bodycolour, on green tinted paper
Verso: River scene with towers of a castle
Pen and brown and black ink, on fragments mounted on two separate pieces of paper
- Production date
- 1500-1510 (circa)
- Dimensions
-
Height: 280 millimetres
-
Width: 192 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Rowlands 1993
It has not been easy to decide from what region of Germany this drawing might have come. On the mount someone signing him- or herself “P” suggested that it was in the “Style of Ma[r]x Reichlich“, a reference to the late fifteenth-century Austrian master (c. 1460-after 1520).
The most convincing solution is that it is from a Swabian workshop, and it is most probably by an artist from Ulm. Judging from a comparison with the paintings derived from there, he evidently worked in the circle of the leading artist at the turn of the century, Bartholomäus Zeitblom. In particular, the facial types in the painting of the ‘Recognition of St George as Christ’ in the Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart, where it is attributed to the Ulm artist Jörg Stocker the Elder ('Katalog der Staatsgalerie Stuttgart: Alte Meister’, edited by M. Reinold-Kohrs, Stuttgart, 1962, p. 204, inv. no. 34; Stange, viii, 1957, p. 36, pl. 75) are distinctly like those in SL,5218.85. The painting in Stuttgart, however, is attributed by Stange to an associate of Zeitblom, one of the artists working with him on the large high altarpiece, inscribed in relief with the date, 1493, in the former Klosterkirche St Johannes Bapt., Blaubeuren, near Ulm. This particular artist, whom he considered was active in Ulm c. 1490-1520, was named by Stange the Master of the Burial of St John (Stange, ‘Tafelbilder’, ii, pp. 134-6, no. 620), from a panel in the high altarpiece at Blaubeuren. Around this work he assembled a group of further paintings, including the panel at Stuttgart (Stange, ‘Tafelbilder’, ii, pp. 143-4, nos. 651-7). The dress in both the painting and this drawing also has details that suggest that they were done at the same period, which could be c. 1500-10. If this attribution is accepted then it would appear to be the only known drawing so far identified from this source, apart from those by Zeitblom's most important colleague, Bernhard Strigel (q.v.). Apart from the rather mundane appearance of the drawing, this factor perhaps explains why it has been so hard to classify. It is evidently a record of a painting, rather than a preliminary study.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1753
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- SL,5218.85
- Additional IDs
-
Miscellaneous number: C,07.85
