Auction 100 / Lot 1521

Verso: On the panel with old wax seal monogram 'RCB'. At the lower margin with a smaller chip (old rest.), min. scratches in the dress of Maria. Overall excellent, largely untouched condition. Comparable compositions are in possession of the 'Landscape with Holy Family' in the Kunstmuseum Basel and the 'Holy Family with the Boy John' in the Historisches Museum in Bamberg. The work offered here is extremely rare. In terms of motif and style, it is very close to the Basel work. To the left a tree delimits the composition and to the right it opens up a view of a wide panorama with finely painted, realistic small individual scenes with detailed motifs: on the right a pond with swans, in the middle ground a farmstead with walkers, behind it a small village with a church, and on the upper left a mountain with a castle. The trees in the middle ground are heightened with microscopic white dots and show the blossoming in springtime. 'Everything up to the horizon and highest mountain peak is filled with a great variety of small, at times tiny, landscape and figurative details .... as well as an assortment of human and animal figures ... filled.' Provenance: Old south-west German private collection.