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CATALOGUE ENTRY

Temptation of St. Anthony

after 1531
Follower of Hieronymus Bosch
Netherlandish
oil on oak panel
23-3/4 × 19-1/4 in.
(60.5 × 49 cm)
The Clowes Collection
2020.1
SEE TECHNICAL EXAMINATION REPORT

Marks, Inscriptions, and Distinguishing Features

None

Entry

This painting is a copy of the central panel of Hieronymus Bosch’s Temptation of St. Anthony triptych in the Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga in Lisbon (fig. 1), created by a follower of the artist. The Clowes painting is approximately one-quarter the size of and narrower than the original central panel. It includes all the major figures of the Lisbon painting, although their depiction is generally simplified. Some marginal figures are also omitted.1

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Figure 1: Hieronymus Bosch (Netherlandish, 1450–1516), Temptation of St. Anthony, about 1500, oil on oak, 51-49/64 × 46-27/32 in. (central panel), 51-49/64 × 20-55/64 in. (side panels). Museu Nacional de Art Antiga, Lisbon, Inv. 1498 Pint.

In the Clowes panel, St. Anthony kneels by the ruins of tower-like building, which likely alludes to the fort that he elected to be the site of his hermitage. Surrounding him is a throng of sinister figures carrying out parodies of Christianity: a sham priest administers a satanic mass around the table next to Anthony; echoing that sacrilegious act, a woman whose long dress appears more like a tail offers a bowl of potion to a nun and a mishappen man; a group of demons, of which one is disguised as a cleric, read a book at the edge of the floating platform; a man and a rodent-riding hag, holding in her arms a swaddled infant, travesty the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt. Anthony, making a sign of benediction, appears unaffected by his terrifying surroundings. The ascetic composure with which he withstands demonic temptations is in keeping with the accounts of his legend told in Athanasius ’s Vita Antonii and later in Jacobus de Voragine’s Legenda Aurea.

The original panel in Lisbon shows Anthony looking calmly at the viewer. His gesture directs the viewer’s wandering gaze to the chapel inside the dilapidated tower, where Christ, standing next to an altar and a crucifix, blesses the saint with an echoing gesture. The diminutive presence of the chapel means that the viewer must navigate the terrain of demonic distractions and overcome them before finding spiritual reward in the presence of Christ. Searching, easily misled, but ultimately reaching the destination, such a visual journey becomes itself a metaphor of Anthony’s perseverance empowered by his faith. This message of spiritual steadfastness, brokered by viewership, would have been particularly salient to the first audience of the triptych, as the work may have been commissioned for a monastery hospital, where Antonine monks attended sick and dying patients.2

Curiously, though, this important detail of Christ’s appearance, serving as the spiritual culmination of the triptych, is missing in the Clowes panel. The empty chapel seems to exemplify the taste of Bosch’s later admirers, who were more fascinated by Bosch’s grotesque creatures, their esoteric behaviors, and the bizarre terrains than by the religious lessons that grounded the artist’s work. On that taste, Felipe de Guevara (about 1500–1563), anxious about injuries done to Bosch’s legacy by imitators, wrote scathingly:

That which Hieronymus Bosch did with wisdom and decorum others did, and still do, without any discretion and good judgment; for having seen in Flanders how well received was this kind of painting by Hieronymus Bosch, they decided to imitate it and painted monsters and various imaginary subjects, thus giving to understand that in this alone consisted the imitation of Bosch. In this way came into being countless numbers of paintings of this kind which are signed with the name of Hieronymus Bosch but are in fact fraudulently inscribed: pictures to which he would never have thought of putting his hand but which are in reality the work of smoke and the short-sighted fools who smoked them in fireplaces in order to lend them credibility and an aged look.3

Rote repetition and outright fraud were the nature of the imitators' work.

But could the Clowes panel’s conspicuous empty chapel be the result of purposeful omission rather than careless oversight? The answer seems to lie in the Triptych of the Temptation of St. Anthony (fig. 2), a copy in the collection of the Gemäldegalerie after the Lisbon original and one that also shows an empty chapel. Given the work’s otherwise faithful adherence to the prototype, it is hard not to consider that exclusion as deliberate. As the Gemäldegalerie’s curator of early Netherlandish and German art, Stephan Kemperdick, suggests, the choice may have been made by its original owner, the Pilgram family from Protestant Nuremberg.4 (Until 1577, if not later, the triptych was in the possession of the family. Their coat of arms was painted on the exterior of the left panel, although it was only discovered in the 1870s, when a later layer of black overpaint was removed.)5 While moderate Lutherans may not have objected to the image of Christ and the crucifix, they may not have accommodated the depiction of a saint’s legend. The removal of Christ, therefore, would have allowed for a different interpretation of the scene, in which Anthony is not a mystic hermit but the protagonist of a grisly fairytale.6 An example to complement this point would be a copy in São Paulo (fig. 3). This panel, first acquired by the convent of Santa Sofia near Seville (serving therefore a Catholic audience), includes Christ in the chapel.7 Given the sectarian implications established by the Berlin and São Paulo copies, one may deduce that the Clowes painting was designed to suit the needs of a Protestant client.

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Figure 2: After Hieronymus Bosch, Triptych of the Temptation of St. Anthony (central panel), about 1560–1570, oil on oak panel, 29-29/64 × 32-3/32 in. Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin, Inv. 1198. Photo: bpk Bildagentur / Staatliche Museen, Berlin / Christoph Schmidt / Art Resource, NY.
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Figure 3: Hieronymus Bosch (Netherlandish, 1450–1516), Temptations of St. Anthony, about 1500, oil on wood, 50-25/64 × 39-49/64 × 25/32 in. Photo: João Musa. Museu de Art de São Paulo, São Paulo, MASP.00179.

The demand for Bosch’s paintings fueled an enormous trade in imitations and forgeries from the middle of the sixteenth to the beginning of the seventeenth century.8 Antwerp became the market leader for such works, having transformed art selling from an annual trade fair into a year-round business.9 Major Bosch imitators, including Jan Mandijn (about 1500–about 1559) and Pieter Huys (about 1520–about 1584), made their name with spin-offs of Bosch’s compositions, creating a repertoire of hybrid monsters as well as judgment and temptation scenes. Lesser-known artists copied not only Bosch but also Mandijn and Huys, creating what University of Pennsylvania emeritus professor Larry Silver calls a “Boschiana” in Antwerp after the middle of the sixteenth century.10

The Spanish king Philip II (1527–1598) was a major participant in this market. Between 1574 and 1593, the king sent six shipments of artworks to El Escorial for the decoration of the palace. The first contained a triptych as well as two single panels on St. Anthony.11 According to the 1564 and 1614 inventories of the Royal Palace of El Pardo, near Madrid, Philip likely owned four paintings—one oil on panel, two tempera on canvas, and one “fresco” on canvas—of which St. Anthony was the subject matter.12 The 1636 inventory of the Alcázar of Madrid, another royal palace, lists four paintings on the Temptation of St. Anthony.13 The sheer number of works attests to the popularity of the subject. Given the context of sixteenth-century Spain, the lesson of Anthony’s legend—the survival of Christian belief under demonic assault—may suggest that the topic provided a timely metaphor for the spiritual anxiety, shared by all social classes, in an age of fierce religious conflict.

In addition to surviving copies and inventory records, evidence of another practice provides insight into the Bosch craze of the sixteenth century. Infrared reflectography, a technology that enables examination of the underlying layers of paintings, has revealed that several Bosch copies were painted over other compositions.14 As Netherlandish art specialist Molly Faries suggests, this recycling attests to Bosch’s continuing marketability in the sixteenth century.15 Indeed, as art historian and museum director Peter van den Brink argues, why would one cover up a finished work if one could not cash in on a Boschian painting?16 The Clowes painting is an example of this practice.

Under the depiction of St. Anthony’s temptation is a bust-length portrait of a man (fig. 4). He wears a small beret, fashionable in the early sixteenth-century Southern Low Countries, and carries a book under his right arm.17 Holding what appears to be a pair of gloves in his left hand, he has in his right hand a letter (fig. 5), which reads: “Dem Erssamen und/ weijssenn Heronymus/Sulzer zu anntorff” (To the honorable and wise Heronymus Sulzer at Antwerp).18 Another “Anntorff,” accompanied by a hook-like sign that is likely a trademark, appears in the lower-right corner of the letter.19 The sitter in the hidden picture can thus be identified with fair certainty as Hieronymus Sulzer (1518–1556), a merchant from the German city of Augsburg.20 The Sulzer family owned a trading business and invested in land-reclamation projects in the Low Countries from the early years of the sixteenth century. No extant record shows Hieronymus ever in Antwerp, but Augsburger merchant families customarily sent their teenage sons abroad for commercial education. He was probably in the Netherlands in the early 1530s, as genealogical records indicate that he was back in Augsburg in 1540.21

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Figure 4: Portrait underneath Clowes Temptation of St. Anthony, X-radiograph, overexposed. Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields, The Clowes Collection, 2020.1.
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Figure 5: Detail of portrait underneath Clowes Temptation of St. Anthony showing letter in hand, infrared reflectogram. Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields, The Clowes Collection, 2020.1.

The underlying picture is one of the few early modern Netherlandish portraits to include textual attributes. Inscriptions, often cleverly integrated into the objects and surroundings, identify the sitter or the commemorative occasion in specific ways. Joos van Cleve’s portrait of Eleanor of Austria, Queen of France (about 1530, Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum), for example, includes a letter in Spanish—“a la xpinisma [christianisima] y muy poderosa sinora la Reyna my sinora”—to highlight her piety and power. Similarly, Sulzer’s portrait uses a letter addressed to him to proclaim his social and intellectual standing. Moreover, as recently identified by Marc Smith, professor of paleography at the École nationale des Chartes, the spine of the book bears another inscription—MORS OMNIA V[ICIT], that is, “death conquers all” (fig. 6). While the letter celebrates social recognition (with the trademark underscoring his industry and achievement), the message on the spine, indicative of Sulzer’s contemplation on the transience of life, demonstrates his moral sobriety.

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Figure 6: Detail of portrait underneath Clowes Temptation of St. Anthony showing spine of a book, infrared reflectogram. Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields, The Clowes Collection, 2020.1.

The discovery of the hidden portrait also proves that the Clowes painting is not a modern forgery.22 Before provenance research traced the painting’s ownership to Gustav von Gerhardt, who was in possession of this painting until 1911, there had been concern that the dealer, Ivan Podgoursky, may have sold G.H.A. Clowes a fake work in 1944. While examination of the pigments later proved otherwise, the underlying portrait—a genuine sixteenth-century work—provided further assurance that the painting was authentic.23 The Clowes painting, transformed from a portrait to a Boschian copy, is an outstanding testimony of Bosch’s vast posthumous popularity in the sixteenth century.

Author

Haohao Lu

Provenance

Gustav von Gerhardt (1848–1911), Budapest, until 1911.24

Mrs. Moric Palugyay (née Olga Gerhardt?) and Mrs. Moric Tomcsanyi, née Margit Gerhardt (1879–1944), Budapest, by 1927.25

Ivan N. Podgoursky (1901–1962), New York;

G.H.A. Clowes, Indianapolis, in 1944;26

The Clowes Fund, Indianapolis, from 1958–2020, and on long-term loan to the Indianapolis Museum of Art since 1971 (C10007);

Given to the Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields, in 2020.

Exhibitions

Mucsarnok [Hall of Exhibitions], Budapest, 1927, L’Exposition Belge: Ancien et Moderne, no. 191;

Denver Art Museum, Chapell House, 1947, Art of the United Nations, no. 97;

Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, Andover, MA, 1954, Shadow and Substance: The Art Film and Its Sources, no. 7;

John Herron Art Museum, Indianapolis, 1959, Paintings from the Collection of George Henry Alexander Clowes: A Memorial Exhibition, no. 7;

Art Gallery, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, 1962, A Lenten Exhibition, no. 7;

Indiana University Museum of Art, Bloomington, IN, 1963, Northern European Painting: The Clowes Fund Collection, no. 19;

Denver Art Museum, 1966, Great Stories in Art, reproduced in leaflet;

Indianapolis Museum of Art at the Newfields, Indianapolis, 2017–2018, On the Flip Side: Secrets on the Backs of Paintings;

Indianapolis Museum of Art at the Newfields, Indianapolis, 2019, Life and Legacy: Portraits from the Clowes Collection.

References

Sammlung des. Königl[ichen]. Ungar[ischen]. Hofrats Gustav von Gerhardt, Budapest: Zweiter Teil; Gemälde Alter Meister, sale cat. (Berlin: Rudolph Lepke’s Kunst-Auctions-Haus, 10 November 1911), no. 61, pl. 30;

Catalogue de l’Exposition Belge d’art Ancien et Moderne (Budapest: Imp. de la Société Anonyme Athenaeum, 1927), 34, no. 191;

Max J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish Painting: Geertgen tot Sint Jans and Jerome Bosch

(Leiden: Sijthoff, 1969), 86, no. 90 (wrong measurements);

A. Ian Fraser, A Catalogue of the Clowes Collection (Indianapolis: Indianapolis Museum of Art, 1973), 106–107 (reproduced);

Gerd Unverfehrt, Hieronymus Bosch: Die Rezeption seiner Kunst im frühen 16. Jahrhundert

(Berlin: Mann, 1980), 273, nos. 89c–k;

Molly A. Faries et al., “The Recently Discovered Underdrawings of the Master of the Saint Ursula Legend’s Triptych of the Nativity,” Bulletin of the Detroit Institute of Arts 62, no. 4 (1987): 19n16;

Molly A. Faries and J.R.J. van Asperen de Boer, “Covering-over or Covering-up: Some Instances

of Re-use of Panels in Painting after Hieronymus Bosch,” in Le Dessin Sous-jacent et la

Technologie dans le Peinture, Colloque XI, 14–16 Septembre 1995: Dessin Sous-jacent et

Technologie de la Peinture; Perspectives, Louvain-la-Neuve 1997 (Louvain: Collège Érasme,

1997), 15–16, pl. 5;

Peter Klein, “Dendrochronological Analysis of Works by Hieronymus Bosch and His Followers,”

in Hieronymus Bosch: New Insights into His Life and Work, ed. Jos Koldeweij and Bernard Vermet (Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2001) 128;

Peter van den Brink, “The Art of Copying: Copying and Serial Production of Paintings in the Low

Countries in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries,” in Bruegel Enterprises, ed. Peter

van den Brink (Maastricht: Bonnefantenmuseum, 2002), 38;

Peter van den Brink, “Hieronymus Bosch as Model Provider for a Copyright Free Market,” in

Jérôme Bosch et son entourage et autres études: Colloque XIV 13–15 Septembre 2001, Bruges–

Rotterdam (Louvain and Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2003), 86–87, figs. 1–2;

Molly A. Faries, “Making and Marketing: Studies of the Painting Process,” in Making and Marketing: Studies of the Painting Process in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Netherlandish Workshops, ed. Molly A. Faries (Turnhout: Brepols, 2006), 7–9, figs. 2–3;

Stephan Kemperdick, “Kopien, Varianten, Reminiszenzen, Vervielfältigungen von Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch und seine Bildwelt im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert, exh. cat. (Berlin: Gemäldegalerie und Kupferstichkabinett der Staatlichen Museen, 2016), 19.

Notes

  1. For example, whereas the Lisbon central panel shows an armored cavalry troop marching over a bridge in the upper register, the Clowes painting depicts one soldier on a horse. ↩︎

  2. See Nicole N. Conti, “Hieronymus Bosch’s Lisbon Temptation of St. Anthony: Parameters for Patronage,” Dutch Crossing 35, no. 3 (2011): 286–294. ↩︎

  3. For Guevara’s text, see Wolfgang Stechow, Northern Renaissance Art, 1400–1600: Sources and Documents in the History of Art, ed. H. W. Janson (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1966), 19. See also Larry Silver, Peasant Scenes and Landscapes: The Rise of Pictorial Genres in the Antwerp Art Market (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006), 134. For a discussion on Guevara’s opinion and Bosch’s reception in Spain from 1560 to 1800, see Helmut Heidenreich, “Hieronymus Bosch in Some Literary Contexts,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 33 (1970): 171–199. ↩︎

  4. Stephan Kemperdick, “Kopien, Varianten, Reminiszenzen. Vervielfältigungen von Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch und seine Bildwelt im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 2016), 19. ↩︎

  5. Bertram Lorenz, “Triptychon der Versuchung des Hl. Antonius (Kopie nach Hieronymus Bosch, um 1560/70),” in Hieronymus Bosch und seine Bildwelt im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 2016), 102. ↩︎

  6. Stephan Kemperdick, “Kopien, Varianten, Reminiszenzen. Vervielfältigungen von Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch und seine Bildwelt im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 2016), 19. ↩︎

  7. Stephan Kemperdick, “Kopien, Varianten, Reminiszenzen. Vervielfältigungen von Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch und seine Bildwelt im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, 2016), 19; Peter van den Brink, “Hieronymus Bosch as Model Provider for a Copyright Free Market,” in Jérôme Bosch et son entourage et autres études: Colloque XIV 13–15 Septembre 2001, Bruges–Rotterdam (Louvain and Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2003), 91. ↩︎

  8. See Erma Hermens and Greta Koppel, “Copying for the Art Market in 16th-Century Antwerp: A Tale of Bosch and Bruegel,” in On the Trail of Bosch and Bruegel: Four Paintings United under Cross-Examination, ed. Erma Hermens (London: Archetype Publications, 2012) 81–95; Peter van den Brink, “Hieronymus Bosch as Model Provider for a Copyright Free Market,” in Jérôme Bosch et son entourage et autres études: Colloque XIV 13–15 Septembre 2001, Bruges–Rotterdam (Louvain and Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2003), 84–101; and Larry Silver, “Second Bosch: Family Resemblance and the Marketing of Art,” Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 50 (1999): 30–56. ↩︎

  9. See Dan Ewing, “Marketing Art in Antwerp, 1460–1560: Our Lady’s Pand,” The Art Bulletin 72, no. 4 (990): 558–584. ↩︎

  10. Larry Silver, “Second Bosch: Family Resemblance and the Marketing of Art,” Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek 50 (1999): 39. ↩︎

  11. The triptych, or the “tabla con dos pares,” as the inventory describes it, was suggested to have possibly been the Lisbon original by Ludwig von Baldass. See Ludwig von Baldass, Hieronymus Bosch (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1960), 232. Paul Vandenbroeck opines that the triptych is a copy. The wings may be Prado no. 2050 and no. 2051; see Paul Vandenbroeck, “The Spanish inventories reales and Hieronymus Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch: New Insights into His Life and Work, ed. Jos Koldeweij et al. (Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2001), 51n13. The two single panels are referred to as “tabla de pintura.” Only one of these “tabla” is said to depict the “Tentación de sant Antón.” The other simply depicts “Sant Antón.” see Paul Vandenbroeck, “The Spanish inventories reales and Hieronymus Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch: New Insights into His Life and Work, ed. Jos Koldeweij et al. (Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2001), 50–52. ↩︎

  12. The terms used for describing the paintings in the 1614 inventory are “tabla pintada al olio,” “lienço pintado al temple,” and “lienço pintado al fresco.” See Paul Vandenbroeck, “The Spanish inventories reales and Hieronymus Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch: New Insights into His Life and Work, ed. Jos Koldeweij et al. (Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2001), 55–57. Argote de Molina, a sixteenth-century chronicler, mentioned that there were seven Temptations of St. Anthony in El Pardo before 1582. This account, however, does not match what the inventories reveal. See Pilar Silva Maroto, “Bosch in Spain: On the Works Recorded in the Royal Inventories,” in Hieronymus Bosch: New Insights into His Life and Work, ed. Jos Koldeweij et al. (Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2001), 42. ↩︎

  13. The terms used to describe these paintings are “pintura al temple,” “pintura al olio,” lienço al temple," and “pintura sobre tabla.” See Paul Vandenbroeck, “The Spanish inventories reales and Hieronymus Bosch,” in Hieronymus Bosch: New Insights into His Life and Work, ed. Jos Koldeweij et al. (Rotterdam: Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, 2001), 58–60. ↩︎

  14. Peter van den Brink, “Hieronymus Bosch as Model Provider for a Copyright Free Market,” in Jérôme Bosch et son entourage et autres études: Colloque XIV 13–15 Septembre 2001, Bruges–Rotterdam (Louvain and Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2003), 84. ↩︎

  15. Molly A. Faries, “Making and Marketing: Studies of the Painting Process,” in Making and Marketing: Studies of the Painting Process in Fifteenth- and Sixteenth-Century Netherlandish Workshops, ed. M. A. Faries (Turnhout: Brepols, 2006), 8. ↩︎

  16. Peter van den Brink, “Hieronymus Bosch as Model Provider for a Copyright Free Market,” in Jérôme Bosch et son entourage et autres études: Colloque XIV 13–15 Septembre 2001, Bruges–Rotterdam (Louvain and Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2003), 84. ↩︎

  17. See, for example, Joos van Cleve’s Self Portrait (about 1519, Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, no. 1930.128) and Jan Gossaert’s Portrait of a Merchant (about 1530, National Gallery of Art, no. 1967.4.1). ↩︎

  18. Transcribed in Molly A. Faries and J.R.J. van Asperen de Boer, “Covering-over or

    Covering-up: Some Instances of Re-use of Panels in Painting after Hieronymus Bosch,” in Le

    Dessin Sous-jacent et la Technologie dans le Peinture, Colloque XI, 14–16 Septembre 1995:

    Dessin Sous-jacent et Technologie de la Peinture; Perspectives, Louvain-la-Neuve 1997 (Louvain:

    Collège Érasme, 1997), 16. In 2019 Marc Smith, professor of paleography, École nationale des Chartes, interpreted the text with the following minor modifications: Dem Erssamen und / weijssenn Ieronymus/ Sulzer Zu anntorff / Anntorff. ↩︎

  19. The trademark appears on the back of the letter, which would have been folded, perhaps more than once, to conceal the inside that would have contained the date and place of writing. ↩︎

  20. See P. Grun, “Die Sulzer in Augsburg,” Heraldisch-genealogische Blätter für adelige und bürgerliche Geschlechter (1905): 41–42. ↩︎

  21. Jacob Strieder, Aus Antwerpener notariatsarchiven: Quellen zur deutschen Wirtschaftsgeschichte des 16. Jahrhunderts (Wiesbaden: F. Steiner, 1962), 168ff. See also correspondence between Mark Häberlein, professor of History, University of Bamberg, and Annette Schlagenhauff, curator of European art, August 2016, File C10007, Clowes Registration Archive, Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields. ↩︎

  22. The underlying portrait was discovered by Martin Radecki, former chief conservator of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, in 1974. ↩︎

  23. Pigment analysis was carried out in 1974 at the Intermuseum Laboratory in Oberlin, Ohio. It has been confirmed that, because of the painting’s use of lead tin yellow, it must predate 1750, when use of the pigment was abandoned. The pigment was not rediscovered until 1942. Peter Klein, who performed a dendrochronological analysis of the Clowes painting in 1994, suggests that the painting would have been created from 1531 onward. This suggestion corresponds well with the underlying portrait, which represents fashion of the early sixteenth century. ↩︎

  24. Sammlung des. Königl[ichen]. Ungar[ischen]. Hofrats Gustav von Gerhardt, Budapest: Zweiter Teil : Gemälde Alter Meister, sale cat., Rudolph Lepke’s Kunst-Auctions-Haus, Berlin, 10 November 1911, no. 61 (plate 30). ↩︎

  25. Catalogue de l’Exposition Belge d’art Ancien et Moderne (Budapest: Imp. de la Société Athenaeum, 1927), 34, no. 191. This can only be explained if the painting was bought in at the 1911 Berlin auction, because both Gerhardt’s daughters are given as owners in the 1927 exhibition catalogue. ↩︎

  26. Statement by Podgoursky (indicating that G.H.A. Clowes purchased this painting in December 1944), undated 1945, Correspondence files, Clowes Registration Archive, Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields. About ten years later, in 1954, Clowes noted that he had just learned from Podgoursky that this painting was “originally owned by a collector named Goodstecher, of Amsterdam”; letter from Clowes to Bartlett H. Hayes, 22 February 1954, Correspondence Files, Clowes Registration Archive, Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields. This could be a reference to Jacques Goudstikker, whose gallery stock was looted by the Nazis in July 1940. A search of the LostArt.de database for items still missing from the family of the renowned art dealer Goudstikker does not list a painting with the subject “The Temptation of St. Anthony” by either Bosch or a follower. Nor does such a painting appear in Goudstikker’s “Black Book” available on the website of the Jewish Museum in New York at https://s3.amazonaws.com/tjmassets/exhibition_pdfs/Akte-38-Blackbook.pdf (accessed 27 April 2022).

    Jan Thomas Köhler, of the Goudstikker Art Research Project, has confirmed that Goudstikker owned another version of Temptation of St Anthony with smaller dimensions (50 x 39 .5 cm); see Catalogue collection Goudstikker: 10e exposition dans les locaux de “Pulchri Studio," exh. cat. (Amsterdam: Goudstikker, 1926), no. 9 (reproduced). Jan Thomas Köhler, email message to Annette Schlagenhauff, 28 April 2022. This version is now in the Museum Boijmans van Beuningen, Rotterdam, No. 2441 (OK).

    It should, furthermore, be noted that Podgoursky was not a reliable source for information. ↩︎