Provenance
Possibly Charles I, King of England [1600-1649]. Possibly James II, King of England [1633-1701]. Possibly Allart van Everdingen [d. 1675], Haarlem and Amsterdam; possibly (Everdingen sale, Amsterdam, 19 April 1709, no. 2). anonymous collection, France. (dealer, Brighton, England); sold 1887 to Henry Willett; by exchange 1894 to Robert Henry [1850-1929] and Evelyn Holford [1856-1943] Benson, London and Buckhurst Park, Sussex; sold 1927 with the Benson collection to (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London, New York, and Paris); sold 1949 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[1] gift 1952 to NGA.
[1] Fern Rusk Shapley, _Catalogue of the Italian Paintings_, 2 vols., Washington, D.C., 1979: 1:211-213. See The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/2192.
Accession Number
1952.2.8
Medium
oil on panel transferred to hardboard
Dimensions
overall: 37.3 x 45.6 cm (14 11/16 x 17 15/16 in.) | framed: 55.9 x 64.8 x 7.6 cm (22 x 25 1/2 x 3 in.)
Classification
Painting
Credit Line
Samuel H. Kress Collection
Tags
Painting Renaissance (1400–1599) Oil Painting Panel Painting Board Italian
Background & Context
Background Story
The Holy Family from probably c. 1500 is attributed to Giorgione in a period when his stylistic development was still emerging from the influence of Giovanni Bellini. The Holy Family subject—the Virgin, Joseph, and the Christ Child—allows Giorgione to exercise his talent for intimate religious painting in the smaller format that his early works favor. The c. 1500 date makes this one of Giorgione's earlier works, before the atmospheric landscape and poetic mood that would define his mature paintings had fully developed.
Cultural Impact
The Holy Family is important in Giorgione's early development because it shows the intimate religious painting from which his mature style would emerge. The c. 1500 painting demonstrates the influence of Bellini on Giorgione's early work—the tender modeling and warm light that Giorgione would transform into the more atmospheric and poetic manner of his mature paintings.
Why It Matters
The Holy Family is Giorgione before his revolution: an intimate religious subject in the tender modeling and warm light that shows Bellini's influence on his early work. The probably c. 1500 painting is from the period before Giorgione developed the atmospheric landscape and poetic mood that would make him one of the most influential painters of the Venetian Renaissance.
