(Antwerp 1532–1603)
The Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple,
oil on canvas, 208 x 158 cm, unframed

Provenance:
Private collection, Belgium

The present canvas depicts the Presentation of Mary to the Temple, recorded in a legend contained in the Protoevangelium of James, a second century work not included in the Bible. The current work is a version by Marten de Vos’ s workshop from the master’s original, which forms the central panel of a winged altar (signed and dated 1599) still in Saint James’s Church, Antwerp.

The diminutive saint, identified by her halo and flowing drapery strides up the fifteen steps (as per the legend) where a Hebrew priest, having cast her father away from the temple for his hitherto barren marriage, throws open his arms in amazement. Her parents, Joachim and Anne, whose long struggle to conceive a child before god’s intervention is recorded in the Protoevangelium of James, are shown below, where Joachim gives alms to a beggar. The dynamic movement of the figures, and the kneeling beggar, are recurring motifs in de Vos and can be seen in the Wise and Foolish Virgins, engraved by Crispijn de Passe the Elder after designs by de Vos.

Marten de Vos began his training in Antwerp, before travelling to Italy in the company of Pieter Brueghel the Elder, although the two masters were marked by a pronounced stylistic divergence. De Vos worked in the studio of Tintoretto before returning to Flanders with a pronounced Venetian influence in his work where he established a busy workshop. The present work appears to have been produced under the influence of Molanus, a counter-reformation Flemish theologian who both defended the use of sacred images, and the furtherance of the Marian cult.