Nursing Madonna is an early 16th-century painting by the Netherlandish artist

Jan Provoost Jan Provoost, or Jean Provost, or Jan Provost (1462/65 – January 1529) was a Belgian painter born in Mons. Provost was a prolific master who left his early workshop in Valenciennes to run two workshops, one in Bruges, where he was made a burghe ...

. It is now in the Musée des Beaux-Arts of

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

, France. Its inventory number is 268. The painting was bought from the Paris art dealer Édouard Warneck in 1893, as a work by a follower of Rogier van der Weyden. It was attributed to Provoost by Georges Hulin de Loo in 1902, and described as one of Provoost's most personal works by Max J. Friedlaender in 1931. Friedländer also stated that the work had to have been painted in the early 1500s, which is today commonly accepted. In the 1930s however, much importance was given to the trompe-l'œil inscription on a piece of paper in the lower left corner, bearing the date 1488, so that even subsequently, the painting was thought to be an early Provoost work. Only in 2003 did infrared photography of the painting's surface definitely establish that the inscription is a posterior addition, without information value about the work's inception. Provoost's ''Nursing Madonna'' presents

compositional In semantics, mathematical logic and related disciplines, the principle of compositionality is the principle that the meaning of a complex expression is determined by the meanings of its constituent expressions and the rules used to combine them. ...

and typological similarities with

Simon Marmion Simon Marmion (c. 1425 – 24 or 25 December 1489) was a French and Burgundian Early Netherlandish painter of panels and illuminated manuscripts. Marmion lived and worked in what is now France but for most of his lifetime was part of the Duchy ...

's earlier '' Madonna and Child'', now in the National Gallery of Victoria, which had itself been inspired by the depiction of Mary and Baby Jesus in ''

Saint Luke Drawing the Virgin ''Saint Luke Drawing the Virgin'' is a large oil and tempera on oak panel painting, usually dated between 1435 and 1440, attributed to the Early Netherlandish painting, Early Netherlandish painter Rogier van der Weyden. Housed in the Museum of ...

'', a hugely influential painting by Van der Weyden. The Strasbourg painting was in turn much repeated and copied by Provoost, his

studio A studio is an artist or worker's workroom. This can be for the purpose of acting, architecture, painting, pottery (ceramics), sculpture, origami, woodworking, scrapbooking, photography, graphic design, filmmaking, animation, industrial design ...

, and his followers (at least eleven posterior versions are known).

References

{{Authority control Paintings in the collection of the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Strasbourg Oil paintings Early Netherlandish paintings Paintings of the Madonna and Child 16th-century paintings