The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of March 29, 2024

Virgin and Child

Virgin and Child

c. 1470–80

workshop of Hans Memling

(Netherlandish, 1494)
Framed: 41.3 x 31.4 x 4.1 cm (16 1/4 x 12 3/8 x 1 5/8 in.); Unframed: 31.5 x 22 cm (12 3/8 x 8 11/16 in.)

Description

This small panel was once part of a devotional portrait diptych (a hinged two-panel painting). The Christ child’s attention seems drawn to something outside the picture and lifts his hand in recognition. The opposing panel, once hinged on the right, would have featured a portrait of its original owner in prayer, now unfortunately lost. Such devotional portrait diptychs were popular after 1400 and remained so until their production ceased around the 1530s. Used in private chapels or within the curtain folds of four-poster beds, they could easily be closed when not in use. Hans Memling was born near Frankfurt, Germany. He settled in Bruges around 1465 where he developed a reputation for his painting skills, and provided works to the Burgundian court, which likely cultivated the taste for small portrait diptychs. This example seems to have been painted by a member of Memling’s workshop, perhaps for a wealthy merchant or clergyman.
  • Private Collection, Spain
    Grete Ring, London
    (Arnold Seligman, Rey & Co,, New York)
  • Toledo Museum of Art. French and Flemish Primitive Exhibition: Catalogue. Toledo: The Museum, 1935. Cat. no. 26
    Cleveland Museum of Art. Catalogue of the Twentieth Anniversary Exhibition of the Cleveland Museum of Art: The Official Art Exhibit of the Great Lakes Exposition : June Twenty-Sixth to October Fourth 1936. [Cleveland, Ohio]: [Cleveland Museum of Art], 1936. Cat. No. 204
    Worcester Art Museum, Perry Blythe Cott, and Henri Marceau. The Worcester-Philadelphia Exhibition of Flemish Painting, Organized by the Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, Massachusetts, and the John G. Johnson Collection, Philadelphia ... Worcester Art Museum, February 23-March 12; John G. Johnson Collection at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, March 25-April 26, 1939. Philadelphia: Printed by G. H. Buchanan Co, 1939. Cat. no. 14
    Paintings in the Cleveland Museum of Art. [Cleveland]: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1945. Reproduced: p. 25 archive.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 433 archive.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966. Reproduced: p. 69 archive.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 69 archive.org
    Cleveland Museum of Art. Catalogue of Paintings. Pt. 1. European Paintings before 1500. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1974. Reproduced: fig. 55, p. 156 - 157
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 81 archive.org
    Martin Nagy, Rebecca. Textiles in Daily Life in the Middle Ages. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1985. p. 30-31, 59
    Vos, Dirk de, Hans Memling, D. Marechal, and Willy Le Loup. Hans Memling: Catalogue. [Brussels]: Ludion, 1994. cat. no. 41
  • Hans Memling. Groeningemuseum, Bruges (organizer) (August 12-November 15, 1994).
    Textiles in Daily Life in the Middle Ages. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 22-March 17, 1985).
    Art and Humanism in the Renaissance. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (January 23-February 25, 1962).
    The Silver Jubilee Exhibition. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 23-September 28, 1941).
    Flemish Paintings, The Worcester Art Museum, MA, (1939); Philadelphia Museum of Art, (1939).
    The Twentieth Anniversary Exhibition: The Official Art Exhibit of the Great Lakes Exposition. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 26-October 4, 1936).
    French and Flemish Primitives, Toledo Museum of Art, Toledo, OH, (1935).
  • {{cite web|title=Virgin and Child|url=false|author=Hans Memling|year=c. 1470–80|access-date=29 March 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1934.29