Maerten Jacobsz. van Heemskerck

(Heemskerck 1498-1574 Haarlem)

The Entombment

Footnotes

Provenance
The Collection of André-Javier Flores, Madrid
With H. Scagliola, Geneva, 1976-78
With Knoedler, New York, 1978-79

Literature
R. Grosshans, Marten van Heemskerck. Die Gemälde, Berlin, 1980, p. 168, cat. no. 52, ill. fig. 77
J. Harrison, The Paintings of Marten van Heemskerck: A catalogue raisonée, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Virginia, 1987, cat. no. 51

Of three known works of this composition, the present painting is considered the prototype. One is now in the Musée de Semur-en-Auxois, the other was formerly in the collection of Robert Langton Douglas, London, and offered at Christie's London, 16 December 1998, lot 128. All depict, with small variations, The Entombment with the dead Christ at the centre surrounded by half-length figures, one of whom looks directly out at the viewer over Christ's shoulder. Harrison believes that this man, shown as Nicodemus, may be a self-portrait of the artist. A dramatic nocturnal landscape with the rocks of Christ's tomb appear behind them. Of all three versions, this is the only one still to include this landscape. The composition was clearly popular, as attested to by the existence of the two early copies and further suggested by Barend Graat's later repetition now found in the Sint Petrus-Brandenkerk, Driesbergen-Rijsenburg.

Grosshans suggests a date of circa 1545, given the greater understanding of the spatial arrangement of the figures, placing it after Heemkerck's earlier Entombment of 1540 which is now in the Pinacoteca dell'Accademia Albertina di Belle Arti, Turin. Harrison agrees with this date, comparing the work to the artist's triptych of 1544 now in the National Museum, Warsaw.