Title

Head of Christ of a Saint Christopher

Generic classification

Object

Date

Century

Cultural context / style

Dimensions

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Technique

Iconography / Theme

Provenance

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Inventory Number in Current Collection

Object history

This large polychrome wooden head probably represents Saint Christopher; it was found by the architect and historian José Gudiol in Sahagún (León). Gudiol himself, together with Walter W. S. Cook, published references to this sculpture, together with another head also in polychrome wood, although in a worse state of conservation, both of which, they claimed, came from Sahagún; it was in their book: Pintura e imaginería románicas, in the 1980 edition - such pieces did not appear in the first edition of the publication in 1950. In the aforementioned text, the scholars pointed out: “We are going to consider, as the culmination of the imagery in the province of León, two gigantic polychrome carved male heads which, without any mutual, stylistic or chronological relationship, were preserved until a few decades ago in the monastery of Santa María de Sahagún. I photographed the first one (fig. 443), around the 1930s, at the home of an antique dealer in Valladolid, who presented it as his find in the storeroom of the aforementioned monastery in León: it would have been about 45 centimeters high and, although in poor condition, broken and moth-eaten, it was a magnificent example from the end of the 12th century. I discovered the photograph of the second head (fig. 444) in the file of Alejandro Ferrán [Ferrant], the distinguished architect and restorer of so many Spanish monuments: after the photograph we published, it was recorded as an 80-centimeter-tall polychrome carving preserved in Santa María de Sahagún. Its stylistic similarity to the works of the sculptors of the portico of the cathedral of León suggests a date close to 1275 for this impressive bearded head” (Cook and Gudiol, 1980, p. 333).

In 1989, R. Steven Janke carried out a study of this sculpture in the book coordinated by Dorothy Gillerman on Gothic Sculpture in America, in its first volume; at that time the work already belonged to the Rhode Island School of Design Art Museum, in Providence. The piece had arrived at this institution after passing through the hands of José Gudiol. A few years later, Franco Mata pointed out that the sculpture described by Gudiol and Cook, fig. 444 of the 1980 edition of his book on Romanesque Painting and Imagery, was the same work studied by Janke and preserved in Providence (Franco Mata, 2011, pp. 119-122)); something that is not at all surprising given the close relationship between Gudiol and Cook's studies and the commercialization of certain pieces that left Spain. José Gudiol was a multifaceted figure, an architect by training, he became a prominent historian, but he also forged an interesting private art collection and, in the same way, he acquired works to be sold to collectors and museums; therefore, his activity as an art dealer was closely linked to his work as an art historian, for which he also had the collaboration of Walter W. S. Cook (Socias Batet, 2013). In 1959 this head of Saint Christopher was acquired by the institution where it is currently preserved: Rhode Island School of Design Art Museum, Providence.

Description

The head is almost a metre long, dimensions that tend to reinforce the idea that it could be Saint Christopher, as R. Steven Janke and A. Franco Mata have pointed out. A saint who was highly venerated on the Jacobean route because, as the bearer of Christ, he was entrusted with the protection of pilgrims. Janke, in Gothic Sculpture in America. I The New England Museums, studied this work in detail and considered it to be from the beginning of the 13th century, basing his opinion on the stylistic similarities with some statues on the jambs of the central doorway of the north transept of Chartres cathedral. This is how she noticed it in his small forehead, prominent eyes, and also in his curly hair, beard and moustache (Janke, 1989). Franco Mata, on the other hand, points out greater similarities with sculptures from Strasbourg Cathedral, which leads the researcher to date the piece to the mid-13th century (Franco Mata, 2011). It is difficult to know what the complete sculptural ensemble would have been like, perhaps he was carrying the baby Jesus on his shoulder, and perhaps there were characters holding on to his belt, as is the case in other representations of the saint on the Jacobean route; what is certain is that it was a monumental sculpture. Something that would fit very well with the description of Saint Christopher in the Golden Legend (c. 1262): “Christopher, of Canaanite origin, grew to be twelve cubits tall in adulthood; his stoutness and giant-like appearance struck terror into those who saw him” (Vorágine, 1984).

Locations

• ca. 1950

  municipality

  Sahagún (León), Sahagún (Spain)

• ca. 1950 - 1959

  private collection

  José Gudiol Ricart, Barcelona (Spain) *

• 1959 - present

  museum

  Rhode Island School of Art Museum of Art. Providence. Rhode Island (United States)