?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 10,000 - $ 15,000
MARTIN SCHONGAUER The Fourth Wise Virgin.
Engraving, circa 1490. 121x85 mm; 5x3 1/2 inches. Trimmed on the plate mark. A superb, richly-inked impression of this extremely scarce engraving, with very strong contrasts and no sign of wear, consistent with the earliest impressions of this subject.
From a series of 10 engravings by Schongauer (1448-1491) of the Wise and Foolish Virgins which illustrate the parable in Matthew 25:1-13. According to the parable, heaven is likened to the house of a bridegroom. The five wise virgins, anticipating that they might have to await the groom, have brought enough oil to keep their lamps burning; they are shown by the artist holding their burning lamps with outstretched arms, facing to the right, with pleasant expressions and with their wedding wreaths on their heads. In contrast, the foolish virgins, unprepared for their grooms' delay, have allowed their oil to run out and have had to go off to buy more. On their return, the bridegroom's door was shut to them. They are shown with downcast expressions, their wedding wreaths on the ground, holding extinguished lamps and facing left. The wise virgins, ready for their grooms, are like the righteous in their preparedness for entry into heaven.
Provenance: Mary Jane Morgan, New York, with the ink stamp verso (Lugt 1879). Bartsch 80; Lehrs 79.
