Front Mould of a Virgin and Child

Formed around a positive model and fired.

Composed of two fragments (top section BK-KOG-585 and bottom section BK-NM-8530-2), which in their original state were likely unrelated.

BK-KOG-585 (top section of BK-C-2018-2):
…; excavated during the demolition of the city ramparts near the Tolsteegpoort, Utrecht, c. 1844;¹¹J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 867. …; donated to the Koninklijk Oudheidkundig Genootschap by J.P. Menger, 1859; on loan to the museum, since 1885

BK-NM-8530-2 (bottom section of BK-C-2018-2):
…; excavated during the demolition of the city ramparts near the Tolsteegpoort, Utrecht, c. 1844;²²J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 867. donated to the museum by the municipality of Utrecht, 1888

ObjectNumber: BK-C-2018-2

Credit line: On loan from the Koninklijk Oudheidkundig Genootschap

In what was a flourishing field of artisanship in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, pipeclay moulds such as this were employed by simple craftsmen – the so-called beeldendruckers (statue-squeezers) or heyligenbackers (saint-firers) – to serially produce small figurines made of the same material.³³See P.L.M. van Vlijmen, ‘Pijpaarden plastiek, vervaardiging en verspreiding’, in Vroomheid per Dozijn, exh. cat. Utrecht (Museum Catharijneconvent) 1982, pp. 12-16; L. Geyskens, ‘Beelden en plaketten uit pijpaarde te Antwerpen’, BRABOM 5 (2002), pp. 9-144, esp. pp. 9-10; S. Ostkamp, ‘Productie en gebruik van pijpaarden en terracotta devotionalia in de Nederlanden (ca. 1350-ca. 1550): Het ambacht van de heylichenbacker voor Judocus Vredis, een archeologisch verslag’, in A. Böing, G. Inhester and T. Sodmann (ed.), Judocus Vredis: Kunst aus der Stille: eine Klosterwerkstatt der Dürerzeit/Judocus Vredis: Kunst uit de stilte: Een kloosterwerkplaats uit de tijd van Dürer, exh. cat. Münster (Westfälisches Landesmuseum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte)/Vreden (Hamaland-Museum)/Borken (Kreismuseum)/Deventer (Historisch Museum de Waag) 2001, pp. 188-256; S. Ostkamp, ‘Van Utrechtse bodem? Utrecht en de productie van pijpaarden devotionalia’, in M. Leeflang et al., Middeleeuwse beelden uit Utrecht: 1430-1530/Mittelalterliche Bildwerke aus Utrecht: 1430-1530, exh. cat. Utrecht (Museum Catharijneconvent)/Aachen (Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum) 2012-13, pp. 108-27. The mould was formed around a pre-existing figure that functioned as a positive or a model made specifically for that purpose. In addition, pipeclay figurines could themselves be used as positives. Moulds procured in this manner, however, were subject to shrinkage and less sharply defined than the original model, thus resulting in ‘squeezes’ of inferior quality. Moulds were composed of two parts: a front and a back. First, a thin layer of wet pipeclay was firmly pressed onto the inner surfaces of the two halves of the mould, using a piece of cloth. On top of this first layer, a second, thicker layer of clay was then applied. Excess pipeclay was subsequently scraped off. Once the clay had sufficiently hardened, the two halves of the figurine were removed from the moulds and conjoined with wet clay to form a single piece. The resultant hollow figure was then baked in a pottery oven at a temperature between 990 and 1000°C until acquiring the desired hardness and creamy-white colour. Lastly, the figurines were often polychromed. Because popular models were reproduced over a period of many years, style offers only limited grounds for determining the precise dating of individual figurines.

Composed of two fragments, this front mould for a Virgin and Child, was excavated during the demolition of the Utrecht city ramparts near the Tolsteegpoort in 1844, together with fragments of a back mould of a similar sculpture (BK-NM-8530-1). The Virgin and Child figurines ‘squeezed’ from these moulds are known as the ‘Utrecht Virgin’ type and date from circa 1425-50 (cf. BK-NM-11299 and -11300). During the same excavation, two other sets of front and back moulds for making this specific model were also unearthed.⁴⁴J. Klinckaert, De verzamelingen van het Centraal Museum Utrecht, vol. 3, Beeldhouwkunst tot 1850, coll. cat. Utrecht 1997, nos. 141, 142. In addition to the set of moulds mentioned here, several other (fragments of) moulds of the same type, also excavated during the demolition of the Utrecht city ramparts, are held in the Rijksmuseum (BK-KOG-1272-A-1,-2 and BK-KOG-1272-V on loan from the Koninklijk Oudheidkundig Genootschap.) To maximize the production rate of saintly figures in high demand – among them the present model – workshops likely utilized multiple moulds. Utrecht was unquestionably an important centre for the fabrication of pipeclay devotional objects, as affirmed by the vast quantities of moulds, misfires and (remnants of) pipeclay sculptures unearthed there. More recent archaeological evidence, however, shows that the mass production of pipeclay sculpture also occurred in other cities, including Amsterdam, Leiden, Deventer, Kampen, Antwerp, Liège and Cologne.⁵⁵A. Böing, G. Inhester and T. Sodmann (ed.), Judocus Vredis: Kunst aus der Stille: eine Klosterwerkstatt der Dürerzeit/Judocus Vredis: Kunst uit de stilte: Een kloosterwerkplaats uit de tijd van Dürer, exh. cat. Münster (Westfälisches Landesmuseum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte)/Vreden (Hamaland-Museum)/Borken (Kreismuseum)/Deventer (Historisch Museum de Waag) 2001, pp. 206-07. The white clay (known as pipeclay) used to fabricate these figurines was nowhere readily accessible in the Netherlands and had to be imported from the Rhineland in Germany and the Meuse region in Belgium.

Bieke van der Mark, 2024

J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 867; I. Reesing, ‘Notre-Dame de Foy: The Reuse and Dissemination of a Late Medieval Figurine of the Virgin in the Low Countries’, Simiolus 33 (2007-08), pp. 145-65, figs. 3, 4; N. van den Berg, B. van der Mark and T. Mostert, Bewaard voor Nederland in het Rijksmuseum: Ruim 300 voorwerpen van het Koninklijk Oudheidkundig Genootschap in de vaste opstelling van het Rijksmuseum te Amsterdam, coll. cat. Amsterdam 2013, p. 15

B. van der Mark, 2024, 'anonymous, Front Mould of a Virgin and Child, Utrecht, c. 1425 - c. 1450', in F. Scholten and B. van der Mark (eds.), European Sculpture in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.709257