The Sacrifice of Isaac

The Sacrifice of Isaac

The Sacrifice of Isaac

Designer:Probably after a design by Reinhold Vasters (German, Erkelenz 1827–1909 Aachen)
Date:probably second half 19th century
Culture:probably French or German
Medium:Enameled gold set with emeralds, rubies, and pearls and with pendant pearls
Dimensions:Height: 7 1/8 in. (18.1 cm)
Classification:Metalwork-Gold and Platinum
Credit Line:The Jack and Belle Linsky Collection, 1982

The size and shape of this pendant suggests that its model was not a Renaissance jewel, but perhaps instead an ornamental cartouche from the rim of a Mannerist silver basin, a plaquette of gold, silver, or rock crystal from a jewel casket, or a book cover. The ornament on the frame and the back of the pendant is a mixture of decorative motifs that were in vogue at several different periods during the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. The central pattern on the back, ultimately derived from sixteenth-century Moresque ornament, is comparable to one of Reinhold Vasters’s designs for a pendant in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, but the identity of the maker of this pendant remains uncertain.

[Clare Vincent, The Jack and Belle Linsky Collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1984, p. 199, no. 119]

Provenance
Arturo Lopez-Willshaw , Paris (until 1970; sale, Sotheby's, London, October 13, 1970, lot 22); Jack and Belle Linsky (until 1982; to MMA)

Copyright Image
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