.jpg&width=1200)
The Nymph of the Spring
Lucas Cranach the Elder·after 1537
Historical Context
The Nymph of the Spring (after 1537) depicts a reclining nude female figure beside a spring or fountain, a subject Cranach painted in many versions. The nymph, sometimes identified as a water sprite from classical mythology, represents Cranach's fusion of Northern and Southern artistic traditions — the German fascination with the forest and its spirits combined with Italian interest in the classical nude. The Latin inscription warns against disturbing the nymph's rest.
Technical Analysis
The reclining nude shows Cranach's distinctive body type — pale, elongated, and smooth — set against a dark landscape. The transparent veil and precise rendering of vegetation demonstrate his technical refinement on panel.
Look Closer
- ◆Notice the Latin inscription on the painting warning against disturbing the nymph's rest — the text is built into the composition, framing the image as a literary quotation rather than a pure picture.
- ◆Look at the transparent veil draped across the nymph's body — it conceals nothing while providing technical justification for the display of the nude.
- ◆Observe the dark landscape backdrop against which the pale figure is placed — Cranach's standard device for making his nudes luminous by contrast.
- ◆The precisely rendered vegetation beside the figure demonstrates the miniaturist precision that Cranach applied even to incidental landscape details.
Provenance
Probably Baron von Schenck, Flechtingen Castle, near Magdeburg.[1] (Bohler and Steinmeyer, Lucerne and New York, 1931-1933).[2] Clarence Y. Palitz [d.1958], New York, by 1939;[3] gift (partial and promised)1957 to NGA; gift completed 1958. [1] Max J. Friedländer and Jacob Rosenberg. _Die Gemälde von Lucas Cranach_. (Berlin, 1932), 53-54, nos. 123-124 (Rev. ed. _The Paintings of Lucas Cranach_. Amsterdam, 1978, 99, nos. 145-146, repro.), cites the painting as being formerly in the von Schenck collection, though this is not verified. [2] Information from a copy of the Böhler stock records in the Getty Provenance Index, Santa Monica; letter of 18 August 1988, from Martha Hepworth to Sally E. Mansfield, in curatorial files. The painting is listed as being on consignment from "Sarasota," it has not been possible to verify Hepworth's suggestion that this might refer to John Ringling. A notation in the stock records suggests that the painting passed to the dealer Paul Cassirer, but it has not been possible to confirm this. Böhler and Steinmeyer was the firm created by Julius Böhler, Munich, and Fritz Steinmeyer, Lucerne, and operated from the 1920s on; see letter of 29 August 1988, in curatorial files, from Julius Böhler to John Hand. [3] Listed as being in his collection in the Exhibition catalogue _Classics of the Nude_, New York, 1939, no. 54.
