Front Mould of a Virgin and Child (?), Fragment

Formed around a positive model and fired.

The top section is missing.

…; excavated, with BK-KOG-1272-A-2 to BK-KOG-1272-O and BK-KOG-1272-V, during the demolition of the city ramparts near the Tolsteegpoort, Utrecht, 1844;¹¹J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 870. …; Koninklijk Oudheidkundig Genootschap, Amsterdam, 1875; on loan to the museum, since 1972

ObjectNumber: BK-KOG-1272-A-1

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.²²See 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.

This partly preserved front mould for a Virgin and Child was excavated in 1844 during the demolition of the Utrecht city ramparts near the Tolsteegpoort. The Virgin and Child figurines ‘squeezed’ from this mould 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.³³Utrecht, Centraal Museum, inv. nos. 1856 and 1858, see J. Klinckaert, ¬De verzamelingen van het Centraal Museum Utrecht, vol. 3, Beeldhouwkunst tot 1850, coll. cat. Utrecht 1997, nos. 141, 142. In addition to the one discussed 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-C-2018-2; BK-KOG-1272-A-1 and -2 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.⁴⁴A. 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. 870

B. van der Mark, 2024, 'anonymous, Front Mould of a Virgin and Child (?), Fragment, 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.25634