Carved from a wooden working block consisting of several parts and originally polychromed. In the hollowed back a casing has been added (probably at a later date) to accommodate three compartments which can be closed by hinged panels (of which only the middle panel remains).

The top of the index finger of the right hand is missing, as is the attribute (tau- or cross-staff) in the right hand. Part of the right-hand index finger has been replaced, as has the tip of the right shoe, a small part of the fold between the feet and a small piece in the right shoulder. The hem of the undergarment between the shoes and the base has been trimmed. The polychrome layer has been removed. Some traces of white and blue paint remain.

…; from the dealer A.J. de Raad, Rosmalen, fl. 10,000, to the museum, with the support of the Stichting tot Bevordering van de Belangen van het Rijksmuseum, 1972

Object number: BK-1972-66

Credit line: Purchased with the support of the Stichting tot Bevordering van de Belangen van het Rijksmuseum

The bearded old man wears an undergarment and a scapular, cloak and hooded cape. His gaze is directed to an open book which he is holding in front of him. Depicted here, is St Anthony Abbot, the popular Christian saint, known as the father of monasticism. His physiognomy, hairstyle and dress correspond with the traditional way in which this saint is portrayed. Although the pig which often accompanies St Anthony is absent, the man presumably had held the tau- or cross-staff in his right hand which, together with the book, are customary attributes of the holy hermit.

Stylistically the figure is still firmly rooted in the tradition of the Southern Netherlandish late-baroque. That explains why, when it was acquired in 1972, the statue was attributed to the Southern Netherlands and dated c. 1700.¹¹J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 345A. However, aspects such as the degree of realism in the hands and head section, combined with the restrained folds of the clothing, suggest a much later origin. The piece presents such close parallels with the work of Petrus Verhoeven (1729-1816) that it can be attributed unequivocally to that nothern Brabantine sculptor. It is in fact one of the best works in his qualitatively somewhat erratic oeuvre.

Little is known about the life of Petrus Verhoeven.²²For Petrus Verhoeven, see J. van Laarhoven et al., Petrus Verhoeven (Uden 1729-1816): Beeldhouwer uit de laatste periode van de schuurkerken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1976. In view of his style, which shows a strong affinity with Southern Netherlandish examples, he is thought to have been trained in Antwerp which was the leading sculpture centre in Flanders at that time. However, no concrete confirmation has been found. From 1760 onwards he was working as an independent sculptor in his birthplace Uden. His patrons were the regional clandestine Catholic churches, and towards the end of his life, the ‘regular’ Catholic churches, which had meanwhile been rehabilitated. On the basis of seventeen signed works, a sizeable oeuvre, comprising some sixty religious figures, as well as church furniture, including altars, tabernacles, organ cases, reliquaries and two wooden monstrances, has been attributed to Petrus Verhoeven. His son Jan (1766-1818) was also a sculptor and worked until his father’s death in the workshop, after which he worked independently for some time.³³J. van Laarhoven et al., Petrus Verhoeven (Uden 1729-1816): Beeldhouwer uit de laatste periode van de schuurkerken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1976, p. 13, no. 2, and p. 25.

St Anthony Abbot was one of the saints most frequently portrayed by Petrus Verhoeven. Besides the present figure, nine other sculptures, a half-figure on a reliquary and a small relief are known to exist with his likeness.⁴⁴J. van Laarhoven et al., Petrus Verhoeven (Uden 1729-1816): Beeldhouwer uit de laatste periode van de schuurkerken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1976, pp. 21-22 and nos. 5, 6, 19, 36, 40, 48, 49, 57, 63, 69 and 78. They all have more or less the same composition. A fine version, closely akin to the present figure, can be found in Reek. The abbot is identifiable thanks to the tau-staff in his hand. That piece is also carved from oak, rather than lime wood, which was more customary for Verhoeven. That figure is thought to date from 1803, the year in which the new church in Reek was consecrated.⁵⁵A. Jansen in J. van Laarhoven et al., Petrus Verhoeven (Uden 1729-1816): Beeldhouwer uit de laatste periode van de schuurkerken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1976, no. 58. The facial type, combined with a flowing beard and a tuft of hair on the forehead of both works, as well as the sculptures subtle, almost painterly muted rendering are very similar. In addition, the pig is absent in both pieces. The similarity with the figure in Reek, who is still holding his tau-staff, bears out the assumption that the present saint is indeed identifiable as St Anthony Abbot.

The affinity between Verhoeven’s portrayals of St Anthony Abbot and a terracotta study of the same saint by the Antwerp sculptor, Walter Pompe (1713-1777) in the Van Herck collection, has already been remarked.⁶⁶A. Jansen in J. van Laarhoven et al., Petrus Verhoeven (Uden 1729-1816): Beeldhouwer uit de laatste periode van de schuurkerken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1976, p. 23. For the terracotta, see C. Baisier et al., Terracotta’s uit de 17de en 18de eeuw: De verzameling Van Herck, coll. cat. Antwerp (Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp) 2000 , no. 26. The terracotta was probably the model for an almost identical, monumental version in polychromed wood which Pompe made for the church of St Anthony in the village of Mook in Dutch Limburg.⁷⁷C. Baisier et al., Terracotta’s uit de 17de en 18de eeuw: De verzameling Van Herck, coll. cat. Antwerp (Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp) 2000 , fig. on p. 100. It is quite possible that, when designing the present statuette, Verhoeven was inspired by Pompe’s renderings. The face with its serene, unassuming expression greatly resembles that of the present piece, as are the sequence of folds in Anthony’s garments, and his contrapposto, with one foot projecting a little over the base. A monstrance Verhoeven made in 1782 for the church in Ewijk (now in the Museum Krona, Uden) is another example of the fact that the sculptor at times derived inspiration from examples from the past: it is a free interpretation of the monstrance made in 1715 or 1739 for the church of Uden by Jacob Smits, a silversmith from Den Bosch.⁸⁸J. van Laarhoven et al., Petrus Verhoeven (Uden 1729-1816): Beeldhouwer uit de laatste periode van de schuurkerken, exh. cat. Uden (Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1976, p. 23 and figs. III-A and III-B. The resemblance was first noted by W. Knippenberg, ‘De Beeldhouwer Petrus Verhoeven VII’, Brabants Heem 18 (1966), p. 65.

Judging from the size, the sides and the flat reverse, the Amsterdam piece was probably originally a sculptural element in church furniture, such as a figure on the outside of a confessional.⁹⁹Jaarverslag Nederlandse Rijksmusea 1972, p. 16. For the evolution of the Southern Netherlandish confessional in Flanders, see S. Zajadacz-Hastenrath, Das Beichtgestühl der Antwerpener St. Pauluskirche und der Barockbeichtstuhl in den südlichen Niederlanden, Brussels 1970 and P. Philippot, D. Coekelberghs, P. Loze and D. Vautier, L’Architecture religieuse et la sculpture baroques dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux et la principauté de Liège: 1600-1770, Sprimont 2003, pp. 185-92, 254-69, 368-87, 599-649. In the hollowed back, three compartments have been added – probably at a later date – using a casing. The compartments could be closed with hinged panels (of which only the middle panel remains). Their purpose is not known, they are too large to have been repositories for holy relics.

Bieke van der Mark, 2025

J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 345A; Jaarverslag Nederlandse Rijksmusea 1972, pp. 15-17

B. van der Mark, 2025, 'Petrus Verhoeven, St Anthony Abbot, Uden, c. 1800 - c. 1805', in F. Scholten and B. van der Mark (eds.), European Sculpture in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20035789