Attributed to Daniel Mauch (Ulm circa 1477–1540 Liège)

With Senger Bamberg Kunsthandel GmbH, Bamberg, 4 January 2019;

From whom acquired.

The aesthetic vocabulary manifest in this representation of Saint Roch accords closely with that of Daniel Mauch, the last major Late Gothic woodcarver to emerge from the celebrated Ulm School in Upper Swabia. The compositional structure, together with the saint’s distinctive physiognomic type and the emphatic treatment of the drapery, constitutes a coherent set of stylistic markers characteristic of the master’s mature work.

The centrally parted beard provides a particularly telling point of comparison, closely paralleling that of Mauch’s Prophet Jonah in the church of Saint-Jacques, Liège, dated 1538.¹ Further corroboration is offered by Mauch’s second known depiction of Saint Roch, located on the wing of the Geislingen Altarpiece in the Evangelische Stadtkirche,² which is related to the present work: in both, the saint is shown clad in heavy robes and a pilgrim’s hat, accompanied by a child at his bare leg who reaches toward the sore on his thigh. The physiognomy is likewise comparable, with downcast, sloping eyes and pronounced bags drawn over prominent cheekbones.

Saint Roch is said to have abandoned his privileged life to care for patients of the plague across Italy, a fact alluded to in the current group. Ultimately, he contracted the disease himself and retreated to isolation, where he survived through divine aid and the companionship of a dog. Devotion to Saint Roch intensified during recurrent outbreaks of plague in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.

¹ V. Trugenberger, Daniel Mauch: Bidhauser im Zeiralter der Reformation, Munich 1990, p. 83.

² Ibid, pp. 229 - 233.