Attributed to Vincent SELLAER (c. 1490-1564) - Lot 78

Attributed to Vincent SELLAER (c. 1490-1564) The Holy Kinship Parquet panel. 141 x 109 cm Unframed. La Sainte Parenté refers to Mary's family, descendants of her mother Saint Anne, who had three husbands. According to the apocryphal manuscripts, and in particular Jacques de Voragine's Golden Legend, there were seventeen members in all. Pictured here are the Virgin Mary with Jesus, Anne and Joachim (Mary's parents), Marie Jacobé (Mary's sister) and her four children. Marie Jacobé was born of Anne's second marriage to Cleophas, married Alphée and gave birth to four sons: James the Lesser, Joseph the Just, Simon the Zealot and Jude (Mark 6:3). One of the most famous representations of this subject is Lucas Cranach the Elder's Holy Kinship Altarpiece, in the Städel Museum, Frankfurt am Main. The style and treatment of the composition are similar to La Sainte Parenté by Simon de Châlons, now in the Musée Calvet in Avignon. The children's faces, meanwhile, are similar to those of the children in La Charité by Jan Massys, in the Palazzo Bianco, Genoa. Finally, we'd like to compare our painting with Vincent Sellaer's Laissez venir à moi les petits enfants in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich.