Release Date: June 15, 2007

Rare 17th-Century Ivory and Significant Schongauer Engraving are Among Major Acquisitions of May 2007 at the National Gallery of Art

François Duquesnoy Flemish, 1597-1643
Christ Bound, 1620s
Ivory, 12 7/8 inches (including integral plinth)
Patrons' Permanent Fund, National Gallery of Art, Washington
(ciick here to order this image)

Washington, DC—At a recent meeting of its Board of Trustees, the National Gallery of Art acquired a broad range of art, from a rare 17th-century ivory sculpture and an important 15th-century Martin Schongauer engraving to key photographs by major 20th-century American photographers William Eggleston and Sid Grossman and prints by Robert Rauschenberg.

Rare 17th-Century Ivory

One of the finest European ivory carvings of the Roman baroque. Christ Bound (1620s) is attributed to François Duquesnoy (1597–1643). It portrays Christ’s body twisting gently to one side while his head pivots onto his shoulder. This daring and nearly unbalanced pose is a brilliant response to the curvature of the tusk out of which it is carved. Veins swollen by the bound wrists are prominent on the smooth musculature. The hands, although close to the body, are cut completely in the round. Although many details are minute and the drapery is paper thin, the 12 7/8-inch sculpture responds to the monumental marble sculpture of the High Renaissance and is an act of homage to Michelangelo's Risen Christ.

“From a technical perspective, this carving is breathtaking,” said Earl A. Powell III, director, National Gallery of Art. “The artist has truly breathed life into this piece of ivory, providing a tremendously sympathetic portrayal of Jesus before the Crucifixion.”

François Duquesnoy was trained as a carver in wood and ivory in Brussels. Later, he became one of the greatest sculptors working in 17th-century Italy. Although he is now remembered for large-scale marble sculpture and for bronze statuettes, he first attracted the attention of the pope and other leading patrons in Rome with his carvings in ivory. None of these ivories have been identified, but this figure is known to be a Duquesnoy invention and is consistent with his work. This ivory contains the vestiges of a crown of thorns—something that is not present in other versions of the sculpture. This inclusion suggests that it is the earliest version and also by Duquesnoy himself. Describing the sculpture as Attributed to Duquesnoy leaves open the possibility that he made the model and left the carving to an expert ivory sculptor.

The ivory was purchased through the Patrons’ Permanent Fund. It goes on view Friday, June 15 in the West Building Ground Floor, Gallery G10.

Related works in the collection include:
Christ Crucified, Unknown carver, German, c. 1700
Christ at the Column, Alessandro Algardi, model c. 1630s, cast probably mid-17th century
A Flagellator of Christ, Alessandro Algardi, c. 1630s

Provençal Painting by Guigou

Paul Guigou (1834–1871) was the leading Provençal landscape painter in France before his contemporary Paul Cézanne achieved a mature style in the 1870s. Guigou’s style was the painterly equivalent to the Provençal terrain he favored: strong and heavily impastoed. In Washerwomen on the Banks of the Durance (1866), the craggy hills rise from the river valley below. On this brilliantly sunny day, washerwomen gather by the river, wrapped against the heat of the sun, their reflections shimmering in the placid water. The river gently disappears into the distance. The true subject of the painting, however, is the vibrant interplay between river, land, and sky.

This painting was purchased through the Chester Dale Fund. It is currently on view in the East Building in the Small French Paintings Galleries.

Related works in the collection include:
Houses in Provence, Paul Cézanne, c. 1883
The Ramparts at Aigues–Mortes, Frédéric Bazille, 1867

Exceptional Schongauer Engraving

The acquisition of Martin Schongauer’s Christ Enthroned, with Two Angels expands the Gallery’s already outstanding collection of this artist’s work. Schongauer (c. 1450–1491) is the most important 15th-century German painter/engraver, and his work is a direct precedent for that of the great Albrecht Dürer. Schongauer made 116 different engraved images; the Gallery has 89 of them in 110 impressions. More significantly, of his 50 most important prints, the Gallery now owns all but 3. This particular impression is one of the finest known, and is certainly the finest in the Gallery’s collection.

It was purchased through the Fund for Art Acquisition established by the MSST Foundation, the New Century Fund, and the Pepita Milmore Memorial Fund.

The engraving may be seen by appointment, in the National Gallery of Art Print Study Room, weekdays, 10 a.m. to 12 noon and 2 to 4 p.m.; call (202) 842–6380. It will go on view as part of the Recent Acquisitions show in May 2008.

Photographs by William Eggleston and Sid Grossman

William Eggleston (b. 1939) is known for his pioneering color photographs that helped inaugurate a revolution in fine art photography in the early 1970s.Through his use of richly saturated colors and careful framing, Eggleston transforms mundane subjects into monumental objects. The Gallery’s new acquisition Untitled (Car in Parking Lot) (1973) depicts a decaying cement parking lot, with a broken cinder-block wall, rusting poles, and weeds struggling through the cracked pavement. In the image’s upper right corner, the back of a blood-red vehicle and a lush blue car jut into the picture, changing an unremarkable scene into a vibrant play of color. It joins three other Eggleston photographs in the Gallery’s collection.

Sid Grossman (1913–1955) deeply influenced American photographers of the 1940s and 1950s. However, because the artist made few prints, his work is not well known today. In the 1930s, he taught at the Photo League, advocating the use of photography as a tool for social reform. Later, he adopted a more experimental approach and embraced blurred, off–kilter, and seemingly random subject matter in his photographs.

The six gelatin silver prints acquired by the National Gallery of Art show both phases of his career. Shoeshine Boys, Harlem (1939) portrays two gangly boys, their faces displaying a sense of desperation. Black Christ Festival, Panama (1945), two works entitled Coney Island (1947–1948), and two photographs entitled San Gennaro Festival, New York City (1948) present a frenzied, motion–filled world. These join three other Grossman images already in the collection.

These photographs were purchased through the Millennium Fund for Art Acquisition established by Gail and Benjamin Jacobs. The photographs may be seen by appointment only on weekdays; call (202) 842-6144.

Related works in the collection include:
Almost at the Mississippi River, Dyersburg, Tennessee, William Eggleston, 1984
Memphis, William Eggleston, c. 1970
Used Tires, William Eggleston, 1973
Aguadulce, Panama, Sid Grossman, c. 1945
Coney Island, Sid Grossman, 1947–1948
Coney Island, Sid Grossman, 1947–1948

Additional Acquisitions

The National Gallery of Art also acquired Robert Rauschenberg’s (b. 1925) early lithograph Stunt Man II (1962) as a gift from Jane and Morley Safer; it joins the artist’s Stunt Man I (1962) and Stunt Man III (1962) already in the collection. Two screenprints, Source (Speculations) (1996) and Vamp (2000)—gifts from the artist and Gemini G.E.L.—further expand the Gallery’s Rauschenberg holdings. The Rauschenberg gifts will be on view in the Gallery exhibition Let the World In: Prints by Robert Rauschenberg from the National Gallery of Art and Related Collections, October 28, 2007, to March 30, 2008.

David E. Rust has donated a 1515/1520 pen and ink drawing by Domenico Beccafumi (c. 1485–1551) entitled A Standing Saint (Saint Paul?), an important work from the Italian Renaissance. This drawing will go on view as part of the Recent Acquisitions show in May 2008.

The Dian Woodner Fund made possible the acquisition of one of Peter De Wint’s (1784–1849) finest watercolors, English Seacoast with Travelers on the Sands (c. 1835).

The R.K. Mellon Fund, the Diane and Mallory Walker Fund, and the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation fund made possible the acquisition of six photographs by members of Alfred Stieglitz's organization of photographers, the Photo-Secession. These include works by Alvin Langdon Coburn, Gertrude Käsebier, Clarence H. White, Herbert G. French, and Karl Struss.

Among several gifts from Ruth Kainen is Edvard Munch’s powerful woodcut The Kiss in the Field (1905), a special artist’s proof printed in red and hand colored. It will go on view as part of the Recent Acquisitions show in May 2008.

General Information

The National Gallery of Art and its Sculpture Garden are at all times free to the public. They are located on the National Mall between 3rd and 9th Streets at Constitution Avenue NW, and are open Monday through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Sunday from 11:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. The Gallery is closed on December 25 and January 1. For information call (202) 737-4215 or the Telecommunications Device for the Deaf (TDD) at (202) 842-6176, or visit the Gallery's Web site at www.nga.gov.

Visitors will be asked to present all carried items for inspection upon entering the East and West Buildings. Checkrooms are free of charge and located at each entrance. Luggage and other oversized bags must be presented at the 4th Street entrances to the East or West Building to permit x-ray screening and must be deposited in the checkrooms at those entrances. For the safety of visitors and the works of art, nothing may be carried into the Gallery on a visitor's back. Any bag or other items that cannot be carried reasonably and safely in some other manner must be left in the checkrooms. Items larger than 17 x 26 inches cannot be accepted by the Gallery or its checkrooms.

For additional press information please call or send inquiries to:

Press Office
National Gallery of Art
2000B South Club Drive
Landover, MD 20785
phone: (202) 842-6353 e-mail: pressinfo@nga.gov

Deborah Ziska
Chief of Press and Public Information
(202) 842-6353
ds-ziska@nga.gov

If you are a member of the press and would like to be added to our press list, click here.