Carved and polychromed. The reverse is flat. The socle is ill-fitting on the reverse.

The statuette has sustained woodworm damage. Anne’s right foot is missing. The figure has been entirely overpainted (after the woodworm infestation).

…; ? Bridgettine abbey Mariënwater, Koudewater, near Rosmalen, c. 1515;¹¹For the history of this abbey and the transitional period and transfer of the art patrimony, see L.C.B.M. van Liebergen, Beelden in de abdij: Middeleeuwse kunst uit het noordelijk deel van het hertogdom Brabant, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1999, pp. 39-57, 62-64, 97. ? transferred to the Bridgettine convent Maria Refugie, Uden, 1713-24;²²Ibid. from where, with numerous other objects (BK-NM-1195 to -1243), fl. 2,000 for all, to the Nederlandsch Museum voor Geschiedenis en Kunst, The Hague, 1875; transferred to the museum, 1885; on loan to the Museum Krona (formerly known as the Museum voor Religieuze Kunst), Uden, inv. no. 0024, since 1973

Object number: BK-NM-1214

In the late Middle Ages, a local ‘industry’ centring on the production of simple saintly statuettes, available in a uniform number of iconographic types, flourished in the city of Mechelen. Given the many examples surviving today, this production is certain to have occurred on a massive scale.³³For an extensive overview, see W. Godenne, ‘Préliminaires à l’inventaire général des statuettes d’origine malinoise, présumées des XVe et XVIe siècles’, ten articles published in Bulletin du Cercle Archéologique, Littéraire et Artistique de Malines: 61 (1957), pp. 47-127; 62 (1958), pp. 51-80; 63 (1959), pp. 30-54; 64 (1960), pp. 108-29; 66 (1962), pp. 67-156; 73 (1969), pp. 43-87; 76 (1972), pp. 1-80; 77 (1973), pp. 87-155; 78 (1974), pp. 93-104; 80 (1976), pp. 71-105, and issued as separate volumes in 1958-76. Referred to as poupées de Malines (Mechelen dolls), these figures derive their name from their full-round faces and doll-like features. After the Virgin and Child, by far the most predominant themes were small groups of the Virgin and Child with St Anne (also known as St Anne Trinity, or in Dutch Anna-te-Drieeën) and statuettes of St Catherine and St Barbara. As established by the St Luke’s Guild of Mechelen, the wood and the polychromy were subjected to very strict quality standards. If meeting this standard, appraisers applied the city’s quality mark to the figure’s reverse – three vertical pales (from the city’s coat of arms) – thus conveying the inspection and approval of both the wood and the carving itself. The presence of the letter ‘M’ (for Mechelen), stamped or branded in front, signified the same for the polychromy. As freestanding works, the completed ‘dolls’ chiefly functioned as objects of saintly veneration. In rare cases, these figurines were displayed in special retables conceived as Enclosed Gardens (Besloten Hofjes), filled with hand-made silk flowers and a wide variety of miniature objects, devoltionalia and decorations in different media, such as saintly relics, metal pilgrim badges, wax medallions, glass-blown grapes, parchment, alabaster, pipeclay, pearls, amber and coral.⁴⁴Cf. C. Ceulemans et al., Mechels houtsnijwerk in de eeuw van keizer Karel, exh. cat. Mechelen (Museum Schepenhuis) 2000, nos. 3-9; L. Watteeuw and H. Itterbeke, Enclosed Gardens of Mechelen: Late Medieval Paradise Gardens Revealed, Amsterdam 2018.

The Rijksmuseum purchased the present group, together with a large number of other sculptures, from the Maria Refugie convent in Uden in 1875. This was the immediate successor of the Bridgettine abbey Mariënwater, a double abbey in Koudewater shut down in 1713. The founder of the Bridgettine order, Birgitta of Sweden, was a key propagator of the veneration of Mary’s mother, St Anne.⁵⁵T. Brandenburg et al., Heilige Anna, grote moeder: De cultus van de Heilige Moeder Anna en haar familie in de Nederlanden en aangrenzende streken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1992, pp. 38-39. For this reason, the St Anne Trinity was a popular theme for Bridgettine devotees. Given its modest size, the present Virgin and Child with St Anne clearly served as an object of private devotion, likely in one of the abbey’s cells. The same can be said of a second, almost identical group in the Rijksmuseum, as well from the convent of Maria Refugie, which bears the Mechelen quality mark for wood on the reverse.⁶⁶On loan to the Museum Krona (formerly known as the Museum voor Religieuze Kunst), Uden, inv. no. 063, see L.C.B.M. van Liebergen, Beelden in de abdij: Middeleeuwse kunst uit het noordelijk deel van het hertogdom Brabant, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1999, no. 86. Both objects testify to the large-scale production of devotional figures that occurred in Mechelen primarily during the first half of the sixteenth century. Details such as the flat rendering of the drapery folds indicate the present work dates from the later phase of this production. Contrary to a majority of the St Anne Trinity groups, the Virgin in the present group sits on Anne’s left forearm as opposed to her right.⁷⁷Cf. W. Godenne, ‘Prélimiaires à l’inventaire général des statuettes d’origine malinoise, présumées des XVe et XVIe siècles’, Bulletin du Cercle Archéologique, Littéraire et Artistique de Malines 61 (1957), pp. 47-127, esp. nos. XIX, XX, XXI, XXV, XXVter and XXXIII. As the socles accompanying these serially produced Mechelen ‘dolls’ were often prefabricated, the fit is sometimes less than perfect. Accordingly, the separately carved, profiled socle on the present work may very well be original, despite the ill match with the reverse. While no quality marks have ever been discerned on either the figurine or socle, they may possibly lie hidden beneath the inept overpainting that currently covers its entire surface.

Bieke van der Mark, 2024

J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 169, with earlier literature; L.C.B.M. van Liebergen, Birgitta van Zweden, 1303-1373: 600 jaar kunst en cultuur van haar kloosterorde, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1986, no. 85; T. Brandenburg et al., Heilige Anna, grote moeder: De cultus van de Heilige Moeder Anna en haar familie in de Nederlanden en aangrenzende streken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1992, no. 123; L.C.B.M. van Liebergen, Beelden in de abdij: Middeleeuwse kunst uit het noordelijk deel van het hertogdom Brabant, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1999, no. 87

B. van der Mark, 2024, 'anonymous, The Virgin and Child with St Anne, Mechelen, c. 1515 - c. 1530', in F. Scholten and B. van der Mark (eds.), European Sculpture in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200115873