Lot 468: ATTRIBUTED TO JAN-BAPTISTE VAN DER HAEGHEN 1688-1738/40

SAINT JOSEPH HOLDING THE CHRIST CHILD

height 19 1/2 in.; 49.5 cm

terracotta

<P>circa 1723</P>

Washington, New York, Cambridge 1979-1982, no. 109 (illus.); New York 1981, no. 36 (illus.); Chicago 1987-1988, no. 15 (illus.)

Cyril Humphris, London

The present terracotta group appears to be a sketch model for the lifesize wood statue of Saint Joseph and the Christ Child in Nôtre Dame de Bon Secours in Brussels by Van der Haeghen. The composition and details are identical. A much looser terracotta sketch-model of this subject by the artist is in the Musée Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels (Washington, New York, Cambridge 1979-1982, op. cit., p. 254, fig. 2).

Van der Haeghen's sculptures of St. Joseph and the Christ Child and St. James the Greater (1723-4) in Nôtre Dame de Bon Secours are among his groups of religious statuary made for churches in and around Brussels in the first half of the 18th century. Only two secular statues by him, of Thetis and Leda made in 1734 for the Parc de Bruxelles in Brussels, are known.