Christ as Salvator Mundi

Entry

Christ is shown as Salvator Mundi, the saviour and redeemer of the world. As he walks towards the viewer he makes a gesture of blessing with the fingers of his right hand. He holds an open book in his left hand and the world lies at his feet in the shape of a large orb, the cross broken off, as a sign of his sovereignty. The three compartments into which the orb is divided by bands carved to simulate metal, refer to the continents of Europe, Asia and Africa. The Messiah wears a loose robe; at the reverse parallel folds hang down over the octagonal base. The figure is finished in the round. It was probably the crowning statue of an altarpiece, free-standing in the centre above everything else, possibly flanked by two figures of saints, positioned lower.⁸ Remnants of chalk and paint indicate that the surface was originally polychromed. When it was purchased by the museum in 1964, however, it was covered with ‘an unsightly layer of glossy lacquer’ and stood on a tall modern pedestal that disrupted the proportions and the three-dimensional effect.⁹ Once the lacquer and pedestal had been removed, the balanced proportions and the quality of the carving came into their own again.

Leeuwenberg dated the work to around 1520 and attributed it to the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head.¹⁰ This anonymous artist was the pre-eminent woodcarver in Utrecht in the period from around 1490 to 1525, after which he was active for another five years or so. He derives his name of convenience from the fine Avesnes stone head (fig. a), probably of a Virgin from an Annunciation group in Museum Catharijneconvent in Utrecht.¹¹ Purely on the basis of stylistic kinship, a large oeuvre has been attributed to this artist and his workshop, primarily as a result of Leeuwenberg’s investigative work. This oeuvre is very eclectic and includes individual statues, two epitaphs, chimney-piece friezes and two pairs of bellows, one of which is in the Rijksmuseum (cf. BK-NM-66). There are also several figures in Germany and five small altarpieces in Norway that are presumed to have been made in the workshop for export.¹² Sometimes a St Ursula in the Rijksmuseum is also included in the oeuvre of this Master (BK-KOG-659).¹³

Within this group some differences in quality, technique and style exist. By some art historians they are explained as the result of various hands working together in one large workshop or the existence of different workshops active in Utrecht that worked in the same style.¹⁴ This dichotomy is particularly great between the core group, which is made from single blocks of native or Northwest German oak, and the export group, made from limed wainscot of Baltic oak.¹⁵ The export pieces are of significantly poorer artistic quality and the figures have a distinctly mannered physiognomy, which is atypical of Utrecht and contrasts with the more naturalistic facial types of the figures that belong to the core oeuvre of the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head. This prompts the question as to whether the export group might have been made elsewhere. Without further explanation, Williamson suggested the Kalkar-Cleves region,¹⁶ but an origin in Brussels or Antwerp, from where there was a lively export trade in altars to Scandinavia, is probably more likely, particularly in view of the style. As Preising exhaustively argued in 2014, the core group and the export group – both of which she places in the oeuvre of the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head – are very closely related to Brabant carving.¹⁷ To begin with, the facial type that is found in both groups, particularly the oval shape with the high forehead and narrow chin, and the crescent-shaped eyes with prominent eyelids is very akin to older Brussels examples of around 1480-1500, such as those from the influential workshop of Jan Borman the Elder (cf. BK-2011-2). This type of eye and the rather thickset forms also appear in Mechelen woodcarving (cf. BK-NM-2498), as does the use of lime wood found in one of the export altars, which is highly unusual for Utrecht.¹⁸ Finally, the lavishly decorated garments and imaginary headdresses worn by many of the female figures by the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head and the export group reflect the extravagant taste of Antwerp Mannerism. Since this style had spread throughout Northwestern Europe – particularly Brabant, the Meuse area, the Rhineland and the Lower Rhine region as far as Utrecht and Amsterdam – this does not provide any clues for narrowing down the possibilities within this area.

The origin of an earlier Salvator Mundi is likewise difficult to establish with any accuracy (fig. b). The statue was part of the collection of the Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum in Aachen but was lost in the Second World War and is now known only from a photograph and a plaster cast. While its composition is closely related to the present figure, stylistically it is midway between Brussels and Utrecht carving and datable to around 1500.¹⁹ In turn, the general style of the Aachen sculpture and the Christ type are very similar to a fragment of an altarpiece with the Arrest of Christ in Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam, whose origin is also open to debate.²⁰ Whereas Defoer and Van Vlierden place this group in the Southern Netherlands (probably Brussels), Dirven locates it in Utrecht.²¹

The Utrecht origin of the present version and its attribution to the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head, on the other hand, are uncontested. Like the Utrecht stone female head from which the Master derives his name, Christ has a high forehead, an oval face with a sweet expression, broad nostrils, very characteristic semi-circular ‘parrot’s eyes’, as Leeuwenberg described them,²² with bags under them, and hair falling in stylized waves from a high hairline. The Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head could have taken the inspiration for his sculpture directly from the lost Salvator referred to above, or indirectly by way of a shared prototype. For the Christ type there might also be a link with the work of the painter and printmaker Jacob Cornelisz van Oostsanen (c. 1475-1533), who worked in Amsterdam. There is a striking likeness, for instance, between his Christ in the 1507 panel Noli Me Tangere in the Gemäldegalerie in Kassel and two woodcuts by him of Christ as Salvator Mundi.²³

There are several comparison pieces that further underline the Utrecht origin of the Amsterdam figurine: a Salvator figure dating from around 1517 on the facade of Paushuize in Utrecht, a Utrecht corbel piece with a Salvator in the Centraal Museum,²⁴ the very similar half-length figure of Christ, hand raised in blessing, on a gold embellished silver ceremonial staff that the Utrecht goldsmith Johannes Vuystinck (active c. 1503-1523) made in 1518 for the bailiff of the former Sint-Salvatorkerk in Utrecht (BK-NM-633) and a large oak Christ as Salvator Mundi in Museum Catharijneconvent that Leeuwenberg attributed to the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head, which, tradition has it, came from a fountain or spring attached to the former Mariakerk in the same city (fig. c).²⁵ These four objects, which can be traced directly back to Utrecht, attest to the great popularity of the Salvator iconography in the bishopric of Utrecht, reflecting the patronage of the former Sint-Salvatorkerk.

The large Salvator Mundi in Museum Catharijneconvent shares the shape of the eyes, the sleeve slipping back on the right arm, the folds of the robe, falling from top to bottom in bowl shapes, becoming V-shapes at the hem, and the ‘metal’ bands around the orb with the Amsterdam figurine. Another striking parallel is that in both works, as in the lost Aachen example, the orb lies at Christ’s feet; he does not hold it in his hand, which would be a far more usual iconography. The similarities in type and execution notwithstanding, there are also a number of conspicuous differences. The face of the Rijksmuseum Christ, for instance, is more detailed and he has a sweeter expression than his Utrecht peer. In this respect it is more closely akin to the core piece from which the oeuvre takes its name (fig. a). The carver of the Amsterdam figure also achieved greater naturalism, expressed above all in the much more flowing folds of the garment and the less graphic execution of the hair. By showing Christ in motion rather than standing still, and moving the arm with which he gestures a little further away from his body, he has also created a much more dynamic and graceful figure than the rather stiff statue in Museum Catharijneconvent. Even so, there is still considerable consensus about the origin of the two figures in the same workshop.²⁶ One explanation given for the differences is that the Amsterdam Salvator figure was probably made somewhat later. Further confirmation of this is found in the addition of the realistic fold at the neckline of the robe and the omission of the old-fashioned collar.

Of all the works attributed to the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head, the present figure bears the greatest stylistic resemblance to an unusually skilfully carved and detailed altar group in the Sankt-Martinkirche in Zyfflich, a village just across the German border from Nijmegen (fig. d). This sculpture, depicting Christ and the Woman of Samaria, is dated to late in the Master’s oeuvre, around 1530, and has modern polychromy.²⁷ The group is not made of Baltic oak like the export works attributed to the Master’s workshop; it is carved from a block of native, in this case West German, oak, as the other core pieces were.²⁸ The facial features, the short, forked beard and the shape of the hands and feet are like those of the Amsterdam Salvator, as is the detailing of the flowing robe falling to V-shaped folds at the hem and the flattened fold at the neck. The relaxed, almost casual pose of the Zyfflich Christ is very similar to that of the slowly walking Salvator in Amsterdam. The face of the woman of Samaria, whose features are the same as those of the Avesnes stone head in Utrecht, is further confirmation that the attribution of this group – and thus also of the Salvator in Amsterdam – to the Master of the Utrecht Stone Female Head is correct.

Bieke van der Mark, 2024