Saint James Major
Saint James Major
- Artist
- Taddeo di Bartolo
- Artist Dates
- c. 1362-c. 1422
- Artist Nationality
- Italian
- Title
- Saint James Major
- Date
- c. 1410
- Medium
- tempera and gold on panel
- Dimensions
- 147 x 43.5 cm (58-7/8 x 17-1/8 in)
- K Number
- K551
- Repository
- Memphis Brooks Museum of Art
- Accession Number
- 61.195
- Notes
-
One of four panels from a dismembered altarpiece. Panels include: K551, K552, K553, K554.
Provenance
(Piccoli); sold to Dan Fellows Platt [1873-1938], Engelwood, New Jersey in 1905; [1] sold by the Trustees of the Platt Estate to Samuel H. Kress [1863-1955] in 1939; gift 1961 to Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, no. MBMA 61.195. [1] See Dan Fellows Platt Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University, NJ; box 2, folder 23, call number C0860.
Catalogue Entry
Taddeo di Bartolo
Saint James Major
K551
Memphis, Tenn., Brooks Memorial Art Gallery (61.195 and 61.196, respectively), since 1958.(1) Wood. K551, 58 7/8 X 17 1/8 in. (149.6 X 43.5 cm.); K552, 58 1/8 X 17 1/4 in. (148.6 X 43.8 cm.). Flesh tones in good condition; mantles very much abraded; some losses of paint; cleaned 1957. These four panels (along with K553 and K554) come from a dismembered altarpiece, obviously of large size. The middle panel was probably a Madonna and Child, possibly K1179 (Fig. 164), which is very similar to the four saints in figure style and in halo decoration. The bishop saint (probably Geminianus)(2) and John the Baptist would have been at the left; and Sts. James Major and Catherine, at the right. The style points to Taddeo's late period, about 1410.(3) Parts of the original frame remain attached to the panels. Provenance: Dan Fellows Platt, Englewood, NJ. (as early as 1908; sold by estate trustee to the following). Kress acquisition,1939.
References
(1) Catalogue by W. E. Suida, 1958, p. 10, as Taddeo di Bartolo.(2) Cf. the St. Geminianus in K104 (Fig. 169), by Taddeo. (3) F. M. Perkins (in Rassegna d'Arte Senese, 1908, pp. 8 f; in Thieme-Becker, Allgemeines Lexikon, vol. XXXII, 1938, p. 396) places the panels fairly late in Taddeo's career. R. van Marle (Italian Schools of Painting, vol. II, 1924, p. 556) agrees; and B. Berenson (Italian Pictures of the Renaissance, 1932, p. 551; Italian ed., 1936, p. 474) lists the panels as by Taddeo.