Pilate Washing his Hands and Saint Martin of Tours with a Beggar and the Donor

Master of Alkmaar (Netherlandish, active about 1504–1540)

Medium/TechniqueOil on panel

Dimensions87.6 x 41 cm (34 1/2 x 16 1/8 in.)

Credit LineMarion F. Winnek Fund

Accession number1980.357a-b

On View

Not on view

ClassificationsPaintings

Collections

Europe

ProvenanceBefore 1930, G. Stein, Paris (?) [see note 1]. June 1, 1932, anonymous sale, Dorotheum, Vienna, lot 1. By 1934, David Goldmann (b. 1887 - d. 1967), Vienna [see note 2]; 1938, seized by Nazi forces and taken to the Kunsthistorisches Museum and stored at the Central Depot, Neue Burg, Vienna, where it was reserved for the Führermuseum [see note 3]; transferred to Alt Aussee [see note 4]; October 12, 1945, recovered by Allied forces and taken to the Munich Central Collecting Point (no. 8875) [see note 5]; January 1, 1947, given to the custody of the Stichting Nederlandsch Kunstbezit (inv. no. 1557) [see note 6]; 1948 until 1952, on loan from the Stichting Nederlandsch Kunstbezit to the Archbishop Museum, Utrecht (inv. no. ABM s212) [see note 7]; March 10, 1952, removed from the Archbishop Museum and sent to Germany for restitution to David Goldmann, New York [see note 8]; until 1979, by descent within Mr. Goldmann's family [see note 9]; May 30, 1979, consigned anonymously by the family of David Goldmann to Sotheby Parke-Bernet, New York, lot 174, not sold; 1979, sold by the family to a private collector, New York [see note 10]; 1980, sold by the private collector, through Richard J. Collins, Inc., New York, to the MFA. (Accession Date: October 15, 1980)

NOTES
[1] According to notes in the MFA curatorial file.

[2] Published by L. Frölich-Bum, "Einige Werke des Meisters von Alkmaar in Wiener Privatbesitz" Oud-Holland 51 (1934), pp. 182-187, as belonging to David Goldmann. When they were in Mr. Goldmann's possession, the two panels formed a triptych, with a 17th-century Spanish relief sculpture of St. Anthony between them. On the collection of David and Lily Goldmann, see Sophie Lillie, Was einmal war, Handbuch der enteigneten Kunstammlungen Wiens (Vienna, 2003), pp. 409-415.

[3] With the Anschluss, or annexation of Austria to Nazi Germany in March, 1938, the possessions of David Goldmann were seized almost immediately by Nazi forces. Goldmann's panels appear in a Nazi-generated inventory of 1939 as no. DG (David Goldmann) 107: "Hausaltar mit zwei Altarflügeln. Werke eines Malers aus der Antwerpener Schule, auf dem einen Flügel Christus vor Kaiaphas, auf dem anderen Christus vor Pilatus, auf der einen Seite ein heiliger Bischof, auf der anderen der gegeisselte Christus. In dem Schrank ein Heiliger." Inventar der Sammlung D.G., in Katalog beschlagnahmter Sammlungen, inbesondere der Rothschild-Sammlungen in Wien, Verlags-Nr. 4938, Staatsdruckerei Wien, 1939, Privatarchiv, reproduced in Lillie, Was einmal war (as above, n. 1), p. 412, no. 107. The panels also appear in a Nazi inventory of July 31, 1940 of works reserved for the decoration of the Führermuseum, the art museum Adolf Hitler planned to build in Linz, Austria: Verzeichnis der für Linz in Aussicht genommenen Gemälde, p. 8: "Ferner als Reserve für dekorative Zwecke ... Niederländisch, um 1500, Hausaltar."

[4] Many works of art stored elsewhere by the Nazis were moved to the abandoned salt mines of Alt Aussee in Austria, where they would be safe from wartime bombing.

[5] Allied troops established collecting points where looted works of art could be identified for eventual restitution to their rightful owners. These paintings came to the Munich Central Collecting Point from Alt Aussee (no. 4095), and were numbered 8875. This information is taken from inventory card 1557 A-B, Stichting Nederlandsch Kunstbezit Archive, no. 846, and Munich Central Collecting Point inventory card, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD (Proprty Card 8875; Microfilm M1946, Reel 50).

[6] After World War II, the Stichting Nederlandsch Kunstbezit (SNK, Foundation for Netherlandish Art Property) was assigned the task of recuperating looted artworks from abroad and returning them to their rightful owners in the Netherlands.

[7] The panels were mistakenly believed to have come from the collection of O. Lanz of Amsterdam. For this reason, they were not returned to David Goldmann immediately following the war, but were taken to the Netherlands along with other works of art destined for restitution by the SNK (letter from Rudolf E. O. Ekkart, Head of the Origins Unknown Project (Bureau Herkomst Gezocht), The Hague, August 17, 2004).

[8] This information was made available through the generous assistance of Arno van Os, registrar at the Museum Catharijneconvent, Utrecht (letter of May 13, 2004). On February 21, 1952 the Archbishop Museum received a letter from the Bureau Herstelbetalings- en Recuperatiegoederen requesting the return of the panels to David Goldmann and on March 10 they left the museum for restitution to him. The panels were listed among the works still missing from Mr. Goldmann's collection in the Verzeichnisse gesuchter Kunstwerke aus österreichischem Besitz (n.d., [1950?]). Their restitution in 1952 to David Goldmann's family has been confirmed in a signed statement by his daughter (May 10, 2004), as well as in a letter from her to the MFA (June 26, 2004).

[9] According to the letter from Mr. Goldmann's daughter (as above, n. 8).

[10] According to an interoffice memorandum (September 20, 1981; in the MFA curatorial file).