The Mass of Saint Gregory
- The Mass of Saint Gregory
- The Mass of Saint Gregory
Frame: 33 3/8 × 37 7/8 × 3 1/4 in. (84.8 × 96.2 × 8.3 cm)
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The most frequently depicted Eucharistic miracle in the 15th and 16th centuries shows the Mass of Saint Gregory the Great (Pope, 590–604), when a Christ figure appeared on the altar as Gregory consecrated the host. Claeissens typically shows Christ as a man of sorrows, surrounded by objects associated with his suffering, death, and burial, known as the Arms of Christ or Instruments of the Passion. Here, they include the head of Judas with the bag of money for which he betrayed Jesus; the cock that reminded Peter that he had denied Christ; the column and scourge of Christ's flagellation; and the lance that pierced Christ's side.
ProvenanceBaron Carl von Aretin, Heidelberg Castle, Germany; [Carl von Aretin sale, Mauer, Munich, November 15, 1887, lot 100]; Johann Nepomuk Sepp, Professor in Religious History, Munich (1816–1919); [Hugo Helbing, Munich, March 8, 1911, lot 92]; [Weismüller, Munich, June 1, 1949, lot 582]; [Lempertz, Cologne, November 19, 1954, lot 33]; [Spencer A. Samuels & Company, New York]; purchased by Sarah Campbell Blaffer, who gave it to the University of Houston, 1963; purchased by the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation, 1979.
Exhibition History"Blood: Power, Politics and Pathology," Museum fuer Angewandte Kunst, Frankfurt, Germany, November 11, 2001–January 27, 2002.
"Sacred Art from the Old and New Worlds," Museum of Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas, June 2–September 15, 2002.
"Pieter Pourbus and the Claeissens Family: The Bruges painting world in the second half of the sixteenth century," Groeninge Museum, Bruges, Belgium, October 12, 2017–January 21, 2018.
"Hidden Layers: Painting and Process in Europe, 1500–1800," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, May 26–September 3, 2018.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
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