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Design for an Altar

Unknown1700-1757

Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum
New York, United States

The left half is shown. The mensa had a convex plan, with four steps in front of the straight central part. The head piece has four steps. The retable consists of a high and complicated pedestal, with the figure of the Virgin praying in front of the Cross. The wall behind the retable had the form of a niche. At its front corner an angel is kneeling upon a pedestal, carrying a candlestick with five arms upon his head. At the corner of the mensa stands a candelabrum with two flying angels beside its shaft, and with a standing angel carrying three candle branches upon the head. The stucco decoration of the wall is suggested but not entirely executed.

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  • Title: Design for an Altar
  • Creator: Unknown
  • Date Created: 1700-1757
  • Type: Drawing
  • Rights: Museum purchase through gift of various donors and from Eleanor G. Hewitt Fund
  • Medium: Brush and gray wash, pen and gray ink, black chalk on paper
  • Provenance: From the collection of Giovanni Piancastelli; Mr. and Mrs. Edward D. Brandegee
  • Markings: watermark: stag shown in profile, in circle
  • Exhibitions: Exhibited: New York City, Finch College Museum of Art, “The Two Sicilies, Drawings from the Cooper-Hewitt Museum" Feb. 4-Mar. 20, 1970; cat. #50, p.28, rep.; Wellesley, Massachusetts, Wellesley College, Sept.12- Nov.22, 1970.
  • Dimensions: 65.3 x 30.6 cm (25 11/16 x 12 1/16 in.)
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

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