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Saint James the Great of Compostella
Saint James the Great of Compostella

Saint James the Great of Compostella

Master of the Saint Bartholomew Altarpiece (German, active in late 15th to early 16th century)
Medium/TechniqueOil on panel
DimensionsOverall: 14.3 x 13 cm (5 5/8 x 5 1/8 in.)
Credit LineBequest of William A. Coolidge
Accession number1993.39
On View
On view
ClassificationsPaintings
Collections
Description
This fragment, probably part of an altarpiece, presents Saint James as a pilgrim like those who flocked to the shrine of his relics in Santiago de Compostella, Spain. The painter is named after an altarpiece illustrating the life of Saint Bartholomew now in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich.
ProvenanceRichard von Kaufmann (b. 1849 - d. 1908), Berlin; December 4, 1917, Kaufmann sale, Cassirer and Helbing, Berlin, lot 133, to Walter von Pannwitz (d. 1920), Heemstede, The Netherlands [see note 1]; transferred to The Aurora Trust [see note 2]; July 6, 1966, Aurora Trust sale, Sotheby's, London, lot 72, to Thomas Agnew and Sons, Ltd., London; June 21, 1967, sold by Agnew to William A. Coolidge (b. 1901 - d. 1992), Topsfield and Cambridge, MA; 1993, bequest of William A. Coolidge to the MFA. (Accession Date: January 27, 1993)

NOTES:
[1] Der Cicerone, January, 1918, pp. 26-27; also see letter from Gerald G. Stiebel to the MFA (April 28, 2002; in MFA curatorial files) and Otto von Falke and Max J. Friedländer, "Die Kunstsammlung von Pannwitz" (Munich, 1925), cat. no. 8. [2] The Aurora Trust was set up in the late 1940s by Walter von Pannwitz's widow, Catalina, as a respository for the their art collection.