On view
European Art
Christ on the Cross,
ca. 1670
Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, 1617–1682; born and died Seville, Spain
x1972-40
One of Spain’s most celebrated seventeenth-century artists, Murillo made numerous paintings of the Crucifixion, varying the composition slightly by raising or lowering the head of the dying Christ. In this late expressive and atmospheric drawing, Murillo set the luminosity of Christ’s delicately delineated body against broadly brushed washes that suggest a turbulent sky. The low horizon line creates the sense that the viewer is looking up at the figure on a hill. The skull at the foot of the cross signifies the biblical location of the Crucifixion outside Jerusalem, called Golgotha, or “place of the skull,” in Aramaic.
Information
Title
Christ on the Cross
Dates
ca. 1670
Medium
Pen and brown ink with brown wash, over black chalk
Dimensions
33.5 x 23.6 cm (13 3/16 x 9 5/16 in.)
Credit Line
Museum Purchase, Laura P. Hall Memorial Fund
Object Number
x1972-40
Inscription
in brown ink, lower left: Barto'e. Muri'o.f'c.
in brown ink, lower right: 400rs
in brown ink, upper left corner: 14
in graphite, on verso lower left: J982
Marks/Labels/Seals
On former mount: Stamp of Sir Bruce S. Ingram (Lugt 1405a)
Culture
Type
Materials
John Rushout, second Earl Northwick (1770-1859); George Rushout, third Earl of Northwick (1811-1859); Lady E. A. Rushout; E. G. Spencer-Churchill (Sotheby’s, Nov. 1-4, 1920, lot 318); Sir Bruce S. Ingram (1877-1963.[ H. Shickman Gallery, New York]; sold by the former to Princeton University Art Museum, 1972.
- Sotheby Parke Bernet Inc. 1920. Portion of the famous collection of drawings by old masters, property of the late John, Lord Northwick. 1-4 November 1920, London., no. 318; opp. p. 57 (illus.)
- Francisco J. Sanchez Canton, Dibujos españoles...material reunido por el Centro de estudios históricos, (Madrid: Hauser y Menet, 1930)., Vol. 5: pl. 418
- Exhibition Of Old Master Drawings At The H. Shickman Gallery, (New York: H. Shickman Gallery, 1968). , no. 60 (illus.)
- Jonathan Brown, "Notes on Princeton drawings 9: Bartolomé Estéban Murillo", Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 32, no. 2 (1973): p. 28-33., p. 28 (illus.); p. 29 (illus.); fig. 1
- Gridley McKim Smith, Spanish baroque drawings in North American collections: [exhibition] October 19-November 24, 1974, (Lawrence, KS?: University of Kansas Museum of Art, 1974)., no. 30 (illus.)
- Ebria Feinblatt, Old master drawings from American collections: exhibition, April 29-June 13, 1976, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, (Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York: distribution by Universe Books, 1976). , cat. no. 227 (illus.)
- Jonathan Brown, Murillo & his drawings, (Princeton, NJ: Art Museum, Princeton University, 1976). , p. 136, no. 54
- Jonathan Brown, "Drawings by Andalusian masters", Apotheca 3 (1983): p. 9-13., p. 161; p. 163, pl. 32
- Jonathan Brown, Susan Grace Galassi, Joanna Sheers Seidenstein and Pablo Pérez d'Ors, The Spanish manner: drawings from Ribera to Goya, (New York: Frick Collection; London: Scala Publishers, 2010). , no. 4; p. 28-29
- Lisa A. Banner, Spanish Drawings in the Princeton University Art Museum, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Art Museum, 2012)., p. 10, cat. no. 3; p. 11 (illus.)
-
Jonathan Brown, Murillo: virtuoso draftsman, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012).
, p. 232, no. A 3 - Manuela Mena and Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Bartolome Esteban Murillo (1617-1682), (Santander, España: Fundación Botín, 2012).
