Hans Süss von Kulmbach
(Kulmbach 1476 – 1528 Nürnberg)
The Mass of the Angels, before 1510
Pen in brown ink
28.8 x 21.7 cm
Monogram "AD" lower middle right
EXHIBITIONS
Kunsthaus Malmedé, Handzeichnungen alter Meister aus Rheinischem Privatbesitz, Cologne, May – July 1934, cat. no. 42.
SELECTED LITERATURE
F. Winkler, Die Zeichnungen Hans Süss von Kulmbachs und Hans Leonhard Schäufeleins, Berlin, 1942, no. 12 (as Hans Süss von Kulmbach).
L. Oehler, 'Das ‘geschleuderte’ Dürer-Monogramm', in: Marburger Jahrbuch für Kunstwissenschaft, Marburg, XVII, 1959, pp. 64, 73 and 151-153, fig. 8 (as Hans Süss von Kulmbach).
W. L. Strauss, The Complete Drawings of Albrecht Dürer, New York, 1974, under no. 1500/11.
B. Butts, “Dürerschüler” Hans Süss von Kulmbach, Ph.D. thesis, Harvard University, 1985, pp. 102-103 (as Hans Süss von Kulmbach).
B. Butts, 'The Drawings of Hans Süss von Kulmbach', in: Master Drawings, 2006, XLIV, no. 2, spring 2006, p. 198, no. B4 (as Albrecht Dürer).
D. Hess and T. Eser, Der frühe Dürer, exhib. cat., Nuremberg, Germanisches Nationalmuseum, 2012, pp. 256-257.
N. Strasser, Dessins des écoles du nord du XVe au XVIIIe siècle. Collection Jean Bonna, Geneva, 2013, no. 4, ill.
PROVENANCE
Étienne-Joseph-Théophile Thoré-Bürger (1807-1869), Paris, for L’Alliance des Arts (1842-1848), Paris (L. 61)
With unidentified collector's mark (HB) (L. 3499)
Johannes Goldsche, Berlin, before 1942
Gutekunst & Klipstein, Bern, 22 November 1956, lot 188
Dr Peter Kröker, Essen (acquired in 1956)
Arnoldi-Livie, Munich (2004)
Collection Jean Bonna, Geneva
In our sheet, closely related to a Dürer composition in Rennes, Kulmbach has concentrated on the angels at the base who in a context of a heavenly mass display a placard to the viewer. In Dürer's drawing this is elaborately filled with calligraphic ornament and inscibed "Do schreibst herein was Ir wollt" i.e."here you can write what you want". Kulmbach evidently sees the angels as crucial bearers of an essential message, well-articulated by Ruth Slenczka*. The drawing implies the situation before the celebration of the mass, whereby good and evil are known, but the ultimate truth, God’s presence in the Eucharist, is not yet evident. Slenczka further cites Dürer's "Speis der Malerknaben" (manual of instruction for painters) which proposes that art contributes to understanding, through which good and evil can be discerned.
The practical relationship between these two drawings remains a conjecture. Lisa Oehler (Das 'geschleuderte' Dürer-Monogramm, Marburg 1959, p. 153) sees in our case a close workshop collaboration between Dürer and his master pupil. In the literature of both artists our drawing is generally regarded as a copy by Kulmbach from Dürer. Barbara Butts, who in her dissertation of 1985 affirms Kulmbach's hand whereas in her extensive article in Master Drawings, 2006, declares this to be an autograph replica by Dürer.
We are grateful to Christoph Metzger, Albertina, Vienna, for reconfirmation of the attribution to Hans Süss von Kulmbach.
* Slenczka, Ruth: Reformation und Kunst. Die religiöse Dimension des künstlerischen Aufbruchs in der nordalpinen Renaissance: Dürer, Cranach und Holbein. In: Schäufele, Wolf-Friedrich (Hrsg.): Reformation im Kontext: Eine Bilanz nach fünfhundert Jahren. Leipzig 2018. S. 72.