Lot 31: WORKSHOP OF DANIEL MAUCH (C. 1477-1540)GERMAN, ULM, CIRCA 1510-1520

PROPERTY FROM THE GUSTAV RAU COLLECTION SOLD TO BENEFIT THE GERMAN COMMITTEE FOR UNICEF VIRGIN AND CHILD ON A CRESCENT MOON with an old Sotheby's label printed: SOTHEBYS / ITEM NO SUB. ITEM and stamped: H009285 / 0037 and a label inscribed: 150 (twice) limewood 75.5 by 27cm., 29¾ by 10 5/8 in.

G. Otto, Die Ulmer Plastik der Spätgotik, Reutlingen, 1927, p. 305, fig. 356

with Hugo Helbing, Munich, 1927 Sotheby's London, 16 November 1972, lot 37

Daniel Mauch was the last great Late Gothic woodcarver to emerge from the famous Ulm School in Upper Swabia. Ulm was the foremost Southwest German centre for wood sculpture and its influence was felt in the rest of South Germany, Franconia, and Austria. Trade in iron, wood and textiles, the advantageous location on the bank of the Danube and at the foot of the Alps, and its function as the seat of the Swabian Union, brought extraordinary wealth to its citizens. By 1500, the size of the city’s territory was second only to Nuremberg. Mauch ran a successful workshop in Ulm from 1503 until the Reformation hit the town in 1531. His extant works include the Maggmannshofer Altar, representing the Crowning of the Virgin, in the Marienkapelle in Kempten, and the altarpiece with the Holy Family in the Franz-Xaver Kapelle in Bieselbach, which is signed and dated 1510. Both of these retables feature a representation of the Virgin that is characterised by the same long flowing hair, slight facial features and crumples on the ridges of the drapery folds that can be seen on the present Virgin. Throughout Mauch's oeuvre, the figures of the Christ Child are animated and have tightly wound conical curls of hair. Particularly comparable to the present Christ Child are the children from the Anna Selbdritt in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg (inv. no. PI.O.199) and the Virgin and Child from the altarpiece in the city church of Geislingen. The overall conception, however, relates most closely to the Oertel-Madonna in the Kunst Palast in Düsseldorf (inv. no. mkp.P 1936-2). This too shows the Virgin and Child on a crescent moon and is also notable for the tender and prudent way in which the Child is held by the Virgin. The drapery scheme of both statues – which emphasises the Virgin’s contraposto by curving folds that run from Her left foot to Her right hip and a crumpled area under the proper left arm – largely follows the same pattern. The present statue differs in the engaging outward gaze of both figures and carefully carved details such as the Virgin’s collar. RELATED LITERATURE S. Wagini, Der Ulmer Bildschnitzer Daniel Mauch (1477-1540), Ulm, 1995; B. Reinhardt and E. Leistenschneider, Daniel Mauch. Bildhauer im Zeitalter der Reformation, exh. cat. Ulmer Museum, Ulm, 2009, pp. 138-145, 152-160, 176-179, 207-210 and 228-233, nos. 1, 3, 9, 20 and 26