Saint Eustace in a Landscape

Artist After Albrecht Dürer (German, 1471 - 1528)

CultureFlemish

Dateca. 1505-1525

MediumOil on wood panel (oak)

DimensionsUnframed: 17 3/8 × 12 7/16 inches (44.15 × 31.55 cm)
Framed: 21 × 16 1/8 × 1 1/4 inches (53.34 × 40.97 × 3.18 cm)

Credit LinePurchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust

Object number31-59

SignedNone

On View

Not on view

Collections

European Art

Terms

DescriptionLeft center, St. Eustace kneels with arms raised with his horse standing right center beyond which stands the white stag of the saint's legend with the crucified Christ in the antlers; rocks, and trees, castle on hill in background; four dogs, rocks, and foliage in foreground.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Seventh Anniversary Exhibition of German, Flemish, and Dutch Painting, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, December 1940-January 1941, no. 46.

The Changeful Earth, University of California, Los Angeles, Spring 1955, no. 74.

Religion in Painting, The Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, AR, December 7, 1963-January 30, 1964, no. 3.

Visions and Revisions, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, October 18-November 24, 1968, no. 2.

Origins: Collecting to Create the Nelson-Atkins, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, August 14, 2021-March 6, 2022.

Gallery Label

This copy of Albrecht Dürer’s famous engraving of Saint Eustace’s conversion is a testament to the German artist’s far-reaching influence. The copyist followed the original with great accuracy. He may even have used one of Dürer’s prints as a pattern, because important features of the composition are the exact same size. Variations, however, can be found in the selection of the plants in the immediate foreground. He also substitutes one of the hunting dogs with a small terrier, believed to be his patron’s favorite pet.

Provenance

With Galerie Neumans, Paris [1];

Purchased from Galerie Neumans, through Julius Wilhelm Böhler, by John Ringling (1866-1936), Sarasota, FL, no. 220, by September 4, 1929-1930 [2];

Purchased from John Ringling, through Böhler & Steinmeyer, Inc., New York, no. K_222_29, by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1931.

NOTES:

[1] Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, Munich/Photothek, Julius Böhler Archive, Commission Index, K_222_29, p. 1, copies in Nelson-Atkins curatorial file.

[2] Ibid. Julius Wilhelm Böhler was an advisor to Ringling from 1925 and became curator of the new Ringling Museum of Art in 1927. The Ringling Museum Archive, which holds object documentation and correspondence between Böhler and Ringling, mostly related to works of art acquired for the Ringling Museum’s collection, contains no mention of the Nelson-Atkins painting. This may indicate that it was purchased for Ringling’s private collection, from Galerie Neumans through Böhler, rather than for his museum. It may also have been purchased with the intent to resell. According to Virginia Brilliant, Ringling owned many paintings that were never actually in Sarasota. Rather, Böhler bought them from European sales or dealers on Ringling’s behalf, paid experts to authenticate them, then sold them for a profit, netting Böhler a commission and Ringling additional capital to use toward building his collection and museum. With thanks to Susan O’Shea, Amanda Robinson and Sarah Cartwright of the John & Mable Ringling Museum of Art for their assistance in searching the Ringling-Böhler records on behalf of the Nelson-Atkins. See also Virginia Brilliant, “Building a Renaissance Collection and Museum After the Gilded Age: The Case of John Ringling” in Inge Reist, ed., A Market for Merchant Princes: Collecting Italian Renaissance Paintings in America (University Park, PA: Penn State University Press, 2015).

Published References

Letter of Certification from Max J. Friedländer, September 19, 1929, NAMA curatorial files, as by a Flemish artist.

The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1933), 23-24, 136, (repro.), as by a Flemish artist.

Alfred M. Frankfurter, “Paintings in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art,” in “The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, Kansas City Special Number,” Art News 32, no. 10 (December 9, 1933): 30.

Letter from Leo van Puyvelde (May 24, 1939), NAMA curatorial files, as by Joachim Patinir.

Seventh Anniversary Exhibition of German, Flemish, and Dutch Painting (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1940), 22, as by circle of Joachim Patinir, The Vision of Saint Hubert.

“Gallery Changes,” Gallery News (The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts) 7, no. 6 (November 1941): 6, as by circle of Joachim Patinir.

The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, 2^nd ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1941), 56, 59, 167, (repro.), as by circle of Joachim Patinir.

“Belgian Art in American Museums,” News from Belgium and the Belgian Congo 5, no. 40 (December 1, 1945): 317, (repro.), as by circle of Joachim Patinir, The Vision of Saint Hubert.

The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, 3^rd ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1949), 76, (repro.), as by circle of Joachim Patinir.

Karl M Birkmeyer, “The Changeful Earth: A Loan Exhibition of Paintings, Prints and Drawings of Landscape from the 16^th to the 18^th Centuries,” special issue, UCLA Bulletin of the Arts (Spring 1955), unpaginated, as by circle of Joachim Patinir, The Vision of St. Hubert.

“Gift of Old Master Prints by Mr. Robert B. Fizzel,” Gallery Events (The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts) 2, no. 2 (October 1959): 12, (repro.), as by circle of Patinir.

Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4^th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 8, 260, (repro.).

Religion in Painting, exh. cat. (Little Rock, AR: Arkansas Arts Center, 1963), unpaginated, as by circle of Patinir.

Stephen E. Ostrow et al., Visions and Revisions, exh. cat. (Providence: Rhode Island School of Design, 1968), 42, (repro.), as by circle of Patinir.

Ross E. Taggart and George L. McKenna, eds., Handbook of the Collections in The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, vol. 1, Art of the Occident, 5^th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 97, 257, (repro.), as by circle of Patinir.

Letter from J. C. Hutchinson to Burton L. Dunbar, June 14, 2004, NAMA curatorial files.

Burton L. Dunbar, The Collections of The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: German and Netherlandish Paintings, 1450-1600 (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2005), 30, 169-78, (repro.).

Achmy Halley and Sandrine Vézilier-Dussart, Marguerite Yourcenar et la peinture flamande/en de Vlaamse schilderkunst, exh. cat. (Cassel, France: Musée de Flandre, 2012), 38, 38n7, 39, 39n7, (repro.).

MacKenzie Mallon, “’A Man We Wished to Work With’: The Kunsthandlung Julius Böhler and The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art,” in Cosima Dollansky, et al, eds., Quelle und Kontext: Objekte, Akteure, Prozesse der Kunsthandlung Julius Böhler (Munch: Zentralinstituts für Kunstgeschichte, 2025): 233-36, (repro.).

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