Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart), The Virgin and Child

In this small painting, the Virgin Mary is seated on a grey stone bench surrounded by a wooden frame. She wears a red mantle and uses both hands to gently restrain the naked Christ Child as he leaps forward with his arms outstretched.

Inserted into the moulding of the arch are the gilded letters of a Latin inscription which cast complicated shadows on the concave surface behind them. The inscription paraphrases Genesis 3: 15, which describes how, after tempting Adam and Eve, the serpent was told by God that Eve’s descendant – Christ – would once day crush its head. In the painting, Christ looks up at the word ‘serpentis’. Running and holding out his arms in a pose suggestive of the Crucifixion, he is hastening to save humanity.

Once thought to be by a follower or even a late copy after Jean Gossart, in the 1990s we realised that this small painting is the original of a famous image by the artist, of which several versions survive. In the sixteenth century, the composition was known to be by Gossart: it was described as ‘that distinguished panel by John of Maubeuge’ in a 1589 engraving.

The picture was once covered in discoloured and degraded varnish, and was heavily overpainted but when it was cleaned its exceptional quality became apparent. The inscription is so beautifully executed it seems unlikely to be the work of a copyist. The oak of the panel has been dated to before 1492 by dendrochronology, and the techniques and materials are similar to those in other paintings by Gossart. The delicacy of handling in such details as Christ’s head and the fingernails of his right hand shows extraordinary skill. The richness of colour, achieved with a very restricted number of pigments, is also astonishing. The letters of the inscription and their shadows are a triumph of the imaginative reconstruction of the fall of light and shadow over convex metal and wood. Moreover, the 1589 engraving was certainly based on this painting as the other versions differ in various details. Although unsigned, this was clearly Gossart’s original. His signature and date probably appeared on the original frame.

The underdrawing shows the artist working out areas of the composition on the panel itself, confirming that it is not a copy. Infrared reflectography reveals free and sketchy underdrawing, the positions of the fingers roughly indicated with a few marks and flourishes of a dry drawing material. Only the architecture was drawn with any precision, using a straight edge and compasses.

The first owner was possibly Pierre Damant, a trusted member of Margaret of Austria’s household. He may have obtained the picture from Gossart himself, as the artist worked for Margaret in the 1520s.