Virgin and Child

Description Nearly life-size, this masterpiece of Burgundian carving comes from a chapel in the cathedral of Besançon. The Virgin and Child, with their thick drapery, weighty bodies, and lack of ornament, reflect the 15th-century movement away from the Gothic ideal of the elegant, slender aristocrat towards greater realism and ordinary proportions. The revolution was initiated in Dijon by the sculptor Claus Sluter, in whose following this unknown master must be counted. The Christ Child's ball represents the world and therefore his dominion over all things: the paradox of the tiny child with infinite power expressed through a childish toy.

Conservation

Date	Description	Narrative
12/31/1969	Technical Report	other
12/01/1959	Treatment	cleaned; loss compensation
12/04/1959	Treatment	cleaned; loss compensation; mounted
5/20/1988	Treatment	cleaned
8/03/1994	Treatment	cleaned

Exhibitions

• The International Style: The Arts in Europe Around 1400. The Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore. 1962.
• Highlights from the Collection. The Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore. 1998-2001.

Provenance Cathedral of Besançon; Mr. Champy, Chateau Saint-Apollinaire [near Dijon], 1906, by purchase; Mr. Décailly, Chateau Saint-Apollinaire, 1932, by inheritance; Simon Le Grand, Amsterdam, 1938, by purchase; Raphael Stora, Paris and New York, ca. 1940, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1959, by purchase.

Credit Museum purchase, 1959