Panel with two birds on flowering sprigs
Nuremberg, around 1580 - 1600.
Eglomisé technique with etched gold leaf and lead black and red outlines against opaque dark blue and tin leaf. Carved ebony surround with brass stringing, H 16.5, W 18.3 cm.
This small pane presumably once decorated the front of a magnificent cabinet. Nuremberg was an important centre for the production of reverse glass paintings in the 16th century. The engraver and cartographer Augustin Hirschvogel (1503 - 1553), son of the famous glass painter Veit Hirschvogel the Elder (1461 - 1526), was one of numerous exceptional glass painters active in the city. He specialised in boxes, cabinets, heraldic panels and game boards. One of his four brothers continued his father's glass painting business, supplying churches with magnificent Renaissance panels, and another of his brothers became a goldsmith.
Provenance
Auctioned by Lempertz, Cologne, May 1983.
Auctioned by Plückbaum, Bonn, March 2011.
Literature
Illus. in Federer, Gold leaf, paint & glass, London 2012, illus. 3.2.
Illus. in Steiner, Goldglanz und Silberpracht - Hinterglasmalerei aus vier Jahrhunderten, Berlin-Munich 2015, no. 1.
Cf. Ryser, Verzauberte Bilder. Die Kunst der Malerei hinter Glas, Munich 1991, p. 93, for a cabinet with similar inlays.
Exhibitions
2015 Schaezlerpalais der Kunstsammlungen und Museen Augsburg.