The Elevation of the Cross from a set of The Passion

Johann Schott|Hans Wechtlin|Ulrich Pinder|Unidentified Weaver's Mark|Unidentified Weaver's Mark

1600 · Wool, silk, metal thread (20 warp threads per inch, 8 per cm.) · European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

With subtlety and dexterity, this tapestry's weavers- who apparently used the monograms AR and ICM- borrowed, enlarged, reversed, and added color to Hans Wechtlin’s design for the woodcut of the Elevation of the Cross in Johannes Schott’s Das Leben Jesu published in 1508. This panel is part of a group of similarly sized scenes from the New Testament, woven across more than two decades, all closely based upon printed prototypes by Albrecht Dürer, Hans Baldung Grien, Hans Schäufelein and Martin Schongauer, as well as by Wechtlin. Together with other surviving tapestry panels now in the Museum Haus Löwenberg in Gengenbach and spread across private collections, these small, captioned Biblical scenes were probably made on speculation for sale to Protestant individuals and religious institutions in the Strasburg area around the turn of the seventeenth century.

Artist

Johann Schott|Hans Wechtlin|Ulrich Pinder|Unidentified Weaver's Mark|Unidentified Weaver's Mark

Date

1600

Medium

Wool, silk, metal thread (20 warp threads per inch, 8 per cm.)

Culture

German, Alsace, possibly Strasbourg

Department

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

Credit line

Gift of J. Pierpont Morgan, 1911