Saint Judas Thaddeus
Simone Martinic. 1315/1320
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Washington, DC, United States
_Saint Judas Thaddeus_once decorated the predella of an altarpiece along with nine other small portraits of apostles, three of which are in the collection of the National Gallery of Art:Saint Matthew,Saint Simon, and Saint James Major. This panel of Saint Judas Thaddeus is among the best preserved of the four and the softness of the modeling displays most clearlySimone Martini (Sienese, active from 1315; died 1344)refined pictorial manner. With his head bowed to one side, the apostle turns away from the viewer to contemplate something or someone beyond the frame of representation. The dreamy introspective air of the young saint is complemented by the delicacy of his gestures, particularly the way in which he draws the fingers of his right hand through the fabric of his mantle. The spontaneous naturalism of this action distinguishes Simone's works from those of his peers.
One of the 12 apostles of Jesus, Saint Judas Thaddeus is identified in the Gospels of Mark and Matthew, as "Thaddeus." In Luke, John, and the Acts of the Apostles, he is known simply as "Judas." However, he is not to be confused with Judas Iscariot, the traitor. Saint Judas Thaddeus's most prominent role in the biblical narrative takes place during the Last Supper (the Passover meal Jesus shared with his apostles the night before he was crucified). In the midst of Jesus's explanation of what was to come, including the assertion that he would return to them, Judas Thaddeus asked an important question. John 14:22: "Judas (not Iscariot) said to him, 'Lord, how is it that you will reveal yourself to us, and not to the world?'” Jesus responded by foretelling the descent of the Holy Spirit on his followers, an event that occurred on Pentecost.
- Title: Saint Judas Thaddeus
- Creator: Simone Martini
- Date Created: c. 1315/1320
- Physical Dimensions: painted surface: 26 x 19.7 cm (10 1/4 x 7 3/4 in.) overall: 30.7 x 23.3 cm (12 1/16 x 9 3/16 in.) framed: 44.4 x 60 cm (17 1/2 x 23 5/8 in.)
- Provenance: Acquired between 1832 and 1842 by Johann Anton Ramboux [1790-1866], Cologne, together with six other components of the same series, presumably in Siena;[1] (his estate sale, J.M. Heberle, Cologne, 23 May 1867, no. 75 [all ten panels], as by Lippo Memmi);[2] the whole series purchased by the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, Cologne, which deaccessioned it in 1922-1923;[3] the four NGA panels, 1952.5.23-.26, purchased together with a fifth panel of the same series, by Philip Lehman [1861-1947], New York, by 1928;[4] the four NGA panels sold June 1943 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[5] gift 1952 to the NGA. [1] Ramboux built up his huge collection of early Italian pictures essentially in the above-mentioned years of his second period of residence in Italy; see Christoph Merzenich,"_Di dilettanza per un artista_ - Der Sammler Antonio Giovanni Ramboux in der Toskana," in _Lust und Verlust_, edited by Hiltrud Kier and Frank Günter Zehnder, 2 vols., Cologne, 1995-1998: 1(1995): 303–314. [2] Without quoting their provenance, the sale catalogue entry states only that the ten busts “ . . . stimmen im Ausdruck wie in der übrigen Technik mit den Wandmalereien im Stadthause zu Sangeminiano überein.” [3] See Kier and Zehnder 1995-1998, 2(1998): 550-552. [4] The four panels in Washington and a fifth, representing _Saint Philip_, are included in the catalogue of the Lehman collection (Robert Lehman, _The Philip Lehman Collection, New York_, Paris, 1928: nos. xix-xxiii). Possibly, Philip Lehman acquired them through Edward Hutton in London, who also handled the panels of the series now in The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. [5] The bill of sale for the Kress Foundation’s purchase of fifteen paintings from the Lehman collection, including NGA 1952.5.23-.26, is dated 11 June 1943; payment was made four days later (copy in NGA curatorial files). The documents concerning the 1943 sale all indicate that Philip Lehman’s son Robert Lehman (1892-1963) was owner of the paintings, but it is not clear in the Lehman Collection archives at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, whether Robert made the sale for his father or on his own behalf. See Laurence Kanter’s e-mail of 6 May 2011, about ownership of the Lehman collection, in NGA curatorial files. See also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1906.
- Rights: CC0
- Medium: tempera on panel
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