4. Early Netherlandish painting (15-16th c.)

The exact attribution of this work, one of the most significant newer acquisitions of the Museum, is a task for further research. In 1993, János Végh ascribed it to a Netherlandish master. The iconographical type of the composition indeed goes back to 15-16th-century Netherlandish prototypes; the architecture is borrowed from a woodcut by Dürer. The Madonna shown as a statue who comes to life betrays the knowledge of Joos van Cleve’s works. The abbot wearing a cuculla has, in all likelihood, the facial features of the donor. The rich grotesque type of decoration of the antependium points to a French or Spanish origin, and the present frame of the work is also Spanish. The subject is an event from a later legend of the abbot of Clairvaux, one of the most influential members of the Cistercian order. Bernard, a great promoter of the cult of the Virgin, was once praying in front of a statue of the Madonna nursing the Child. He begged her to “Show that you are a mother ...” (Monstra te esse matrem). The statue became alive and squirted milk on Bernard’s lips. The scene is called Lactatio after this event. The ancient motif of a statue coming alive reappears in another legend of Bernard: once a statue of Christ hanging on the cross bent down to the saint and kissed him.