A devotional pendant with St. James the Great
Lombardy, around 1600
Glass painted on reverse in eglomisé technique with opaque and lustrous pigments, etched gold leaf, tin leaf. In the original silver frame with remnants of gilding and a later engraving of the Mater Dolorosa incsribed "Brussel" set into the reverse, H 6.5, W 5.8 cm.
This fluidly painted depiction of the saint in profile with a finely etched nimbus, sun and stars is reminiscent of limousin enamel work of the time. Three comparable pendants in museum possession show a very similar type, also with an abbreviated Italian designation in capitals as a signature, and are attributed to "Lombardy, c. 1600": The Vitromusée in Romont/Switzerland owns a pendant with John the Baptist in the Ryser Collection, the Fundación Lázaro Galdiano in Madrid an example with St. Mark and the Museo Palazzo Madama in Turin another pendant of this type.
Provenance
Collection of Elisabeth Sprüngli-Halter, Zurich.
Auctioned by Schuler, Zurich, September 2013.
Literature
Illus. in Steiner, Goldglanz und Silberpracht – Hinterglasmalerei aus vier Jahrhunderten, Berlin-Munich 2015, no. 15.
Cf. Ryser, Verzauberte Bilder. Die Kunst der Malerei hinter Glas, Munich 1991, illus. p. 75.
See also Arbeteta Mira, El arte de la joyería en la Fundación Lázaro Galdiano. Fundación Lázaro Galdiano-Caja Segovia, Segovia, 2003, cat. no. 103.
See also Petennati, I Vetri dorati, graffiti e i vetri dipinti, Turin 1978, cat. no. 80.