Czére Andrea szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei 105. (Budapest, 2006)

ANDRÁS FÁY - MIKLÓS GÁLOS: The Restoration of Maarten van Heemskerck's Budapest Lamentation Panel

of the figures towards the edge of the painting, jammed behind each other, betrays a similar mode of composition. The holy woman with her head inclined in the upper left corner of the Torino painting recurs in a similar position wearing similar clothes as in the Budapest work. After the restoration, the parallels to the figure in profile in the Torino Entombment and the holy woman gazing at the viewer in tears have also become visible. The nails held in Nicodemus' gloved hands appear in the Torino picture next to the jar of ointment, on the edge of the tomb. Consequently, the restoration of the panel extensively justified Baldass' and Grosshans' opinion, who in spite of the overpaintings falsifying the painting, arrived at a correct conclusion in regard to the painting's place in the master's oeuvre. So we do not have to reconsider the painting's dating offered by Grosshans either: the Lamentation of Christ in Budapest is a typical work from the early 1540s. The Entombment in Torino is the central panel of a triptych, whose wings along with the depictions of the donating family, have also survived.

29 Because of the similar dimensions and theme, it is quite probable that the Budapest panel also formed the central part of such a smallsized altar. If this was the case, the wings have been destroyed or remain untraced; paintings which could belong to the Budapest Lamentation as wings can be found neither among the alter wings by Heemskerck that have survived nor among his works known from documents.

30 The absence of the charcoal underdrawing in the Budapest panel is not atypical in Heemskerck' work. This phenomenon can be observed mainly in the master's early paintings.

31 The charcoal underdrawing is absent in such outstanding works as the Vir Dolorum in the Museum voor Schone Künsten, Gent, and in Heemskerck's early masterpiece, the Saint Luke Painting the Virgin in the Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem.

32 The situation is the same for the Vienna wings of the Torino Deposition?^ The study carried out on the Budapest work did not reveal any trace of the rectilinear grids used in the enlargement and transfer to the panel of preliminary drawings made on paper, as can be observed in the altar wings of the National Gallery of London, also dated to around 1540, although much larger in size.

34 In the case of our painting this can be explained by the fact that the production of such a small-size altar panel must have been routine work for Heemskerck. Heemskerck's painting in Budapest, as the central panel of an altarpiece produced for private devotion with a conventional theme, does not belong to the outstanding, significant turning points of his œuvre.

3- Nevertheless, because of its masterly execution, it perfectly represents the Romanist trend in the Budapest collection. Its status within his œuvre has not altered even in light of the knowledge available in regard to the complete composition, however, those