The Adoration of the Shepherds is a circa 1480 oil on panel by the Colmar painter-engraver Martin Schongauer in the collection of the Gemäldegalerie, Berlin.[1]
| The Adoration of the Shepherds | |
|---|---|
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| Artist | Martin Schongauer |
| Year | circa 1480 |
| Medium | Oil on panel |
| Dimensions | 37.5 cm × 28 cm (14.8 in × 11 in) |
| Location | Gemäldegalerie, Berlin |
The scene is the Adoration of the Shepherds. Mary kneels before her child, which lies on swaddling clothes. Behind her are Joseph standing with ox and donkey, and facing her are three shepherds who lean forward towards the Child Jesus. The iconography closely resembles the revelations of Bridget of Sweden which were still popular in Schongauer's time a century after she wrote them.
These include the elderly features of Joseph contrasted with the youthful features of the Virgin, her praying hands, her loose blond curly hair, and the miraculously clean and painless birth with the child sprouting spontaneously from its kneeling mother's womb keeping her virginity intact with no visible umbilical cord or afterbirth.[2] Schongauer was probably influenced by Flemish painters such as Rogier van der Weyden and Hans Memling that he had seen on trips to Spain or Flanders. In turn his placement of the figures was an influence on later painters such as Albrecht Dürer and Hans Burgkmair the Elder.
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Small nativity, engraving by Schongauer -
Large nativity, engraving by Schongauer -
Nativity by Rogier van der Weyden about 30 years earlier -
Nativity by Hans Memling about 10 years earlier -
Nativity by Gerard David about the same time -
Nativity by Albrecht Dürer about 20 years later -
Nativity by Hans Burgkmair the Elder about 40 years later
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The painting was purchased for the museum in 1902 by the museum friends' society called Kaiser-Friedrich-Museums-Verein. Its provenance before that is unknown.
References
edit- ^ "Die Geburt Christi mit der Anbetung der Hirten". Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Retrieved 2024-04-19.
- ^ Vision of Saint Bridget in Chapter 8, "Revelations of St. Bridget, on the life and passion of Our Lord, and the life of His Blessed Mother", 1862 edition on archive.org
- Inventory nr. 1629 in Die Gemäldegalerie des Kaiser-Friedrich-Museums, vollständiger beschreibender Katalog, mit Abbildungen sämtlicher Gemälde, im Auftrag der Generalverwaltung der Königlichen Museen bearbeitet von Hans Posse, 1909
- 290550 in RKDimages