Gothic Ivories Project | Openwork panel (plaque ajourée), 4 registers (colonnettes) (Front)

Left
Register 1: Trinity; Gnadenstuhl (Throne of Mercy); God the Father holding Christ on the cross; dove of the Holy Spirit issuing from the mouth of God the Father.
Register 2: Betrayal (Taking of Christ; Kiss of Judas); lantern.
Register 3: Deposition with the Virgin holding Christ's hand; Joseph of Arimathea holding Christ's body; saint John the Evangelist; man with pincers removing the nail from Christ's feet.
Register 4: Carrying of the Cross; man holding a hammer.
Centre
Register 1: Christ displaying his wounds (Last Judgement, if combined with the scene to the right).Christ enthroned.
Register 2: Agony in the Garden (Christ at Gethsemane); angels in prayer.
Register 3: Crucifixion; Virgin supported by one of the Holy Women; saint John the Evangelist.
Register 4: Flagellation.
Right
Register 1: Saint Michael holding a cross and scales; souls in the scales; demon.
Register 2: Resurrection; angel seated on the tomb and three soldiers asleep.
Register 3: Entombment with Virgin kissing Christ; saint Mary Magdalene raising her arms; tomb decorated with pierced trefoils.
Register 4: Noli me Tangere (Christ appearing to saint Mary Magdalene) merging with Harrowing of Hell with souls coming out of the Mouth of Hell.
Architectural framework. Men and women kneeling in prayer under niches. Flamboyant tracery in the spandrels. Pinnacles.

Molinier 1890: Italy, 15th century.
Molinier 1904: Italy, 15th century.
Koechlin 1924: England or France, mid 15th century.
Egbert 1929: Germany or North Italy under very strong German influence.
Natanson 1951: England, 15th century.
Museum's opinion 2012: Northern France or Southern Netherlands, 15th century.

Attribution
Unknown

Reverse
Raised ivory border around wooden backing.
Labels on the backing. Blue and white label with handwritten inscription: 'o.147'. White label with printed inscription: '1018'. Red and white 'EXP[ositi]on RETROSPECTIVE 1900' label with handwritten inscription: 'Oppenheim Cologne'.

Object Condition
Missing: right arm of cross in the Crucifixion; Christ's staff in the Resurrection.
Cross broken in the Deposition scene.

Comments
Related to 17.190.266, also in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Provenance
Collection of Frédéric Spitzer (d. 1890): his sale, Chevallier and Mannheim, Paris, 17 April 1893, lot 147 and 148. Collection of Baron Albert Oppenheim, Cologne: sale 1906. Collection of J. Pierpont Morgan (d. 1913), London and New York; estate of J. Pierpont Morgan (1913-1917); gift of J. Pierpont Morgan in 1917.

Bibliography
La Collection Spitzer (Paris, 1890), I, nos. 112-113 (E. Molinier).
A. Schnütgen, 'Zwei durchbrochene Elfenbeintafeln aus dem Amfang des XV. Jahrhunderts', in Zeitschrift für Christliche Kunst (1893), cols. 97-98, pl. IV
Exposition rétrospective de l'art français des origines à 1800, exhibition catalogue, Paris, Petit Palais, 1900.
Kunsthistorische Ausstellung Düsseldorf, exhibition catalogue, Düsseldorf, 1902, no. 1213, 1214.
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, pp. 324-328, 484; II, no. 875; III, Pl. CLVII.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Pierpont Morgan Wing handbook (New York, 1925), figs. 66, 67.
M. Longhurst, English Ivories (London, 1926), Pl. 49, 50, no. LXXII and LXXIII.
D. D. Egbert, 'North Italian Gothic Ivories in the Museo Cristiano of the Vatican Library', in Art Studies 7 (1929), pp. 196, 198-201, fig. 56.
The Pierpont Morgan wing: a handbook by Joseph Breck and Meyric Rogers (New York, 1929), 2nd ed., p. 117, fig. 66 and 67.
J. Natanson, Gothic Ivories of the 13th and 14th Centuries (London, 1951), p. 39, fig. 63.
J. Warren, Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture in the Ashmolean Museum, 3 vols (Oxford, 2014), Vol. 2: Sculptures in Stone, Clay, Ivory, Bone and Wood, pp. 594-5, in relation to no. 179.

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