The Adoration of the Eucharist
Peter Paul Rubens·c. 1626
Historical Context
The Adoration of the Eucharist (c. 1626) is an oil sketch for the Triumph of the Eucharist tapestry cycle — the most ambitious textile commission of the seventeenth century, produced for the Convent of the Descalzas Reales in Madrid at the personal request of the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia, governor of the Spanish Netherlands. The cycle comprised twenty monumental tapestries woven at the workshops of Jan Raes and Jacob Geubels in Brussels from designs by Rubens, translating his painted compositions into the medium of silk, wool, and gold thread. The subject — scenes of Catholic triumph over heresy, paganism, and ignorance, centred on the Eucharist as the supreme Catholic sacrament — represented the Counter-Reformation programme in its most visually ambitious form. The oil sketch demonstrates Rubens's design method: freely painted, chromatically suggestive, capturing the essential compositional relationships that the weavers would then translate into the more deliberate work of the loom. The Art Institute's holding belongs to a significant group of Rubens oil sketches preserved in American collections.
Technical Analysis
The modello shows Rubens's characteristic ability to orchestrate complex multi-figure compositions with dynamic energy. Swirling draperies and ecstatic gestures are captured in fluid brushwork on panel, with the warm gold tones anticipating the tapestry medium.
Look Closer
- ◆Angels descend in a golden cascade of light, creating a visual link between the earthly ceremony below and divine approval from above.
- ◆The monumental Eucharistic monstrance at the center catches light like a radiant sun, establishing the theological focal point of the composition.
- ◆Rubens differentiates the textures of ecclesiastical vestments — silk chasubles, gold-threaded copes, and linen albs — with virtuoso brushwork.
- ◆The architectural backdrop features massive twisted Solomonic columns, a motif Rubens associated with the original Temple of Jerusalem.
Condition & Conservation
This is an oil sketch for one of the Triumph of the Eucharist tapestry series commissioned by the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia for the Convent of the Descalzas Reales in Madrid. As a preparatory modello, it retains its vigorous, fluid brushwork. The panel has been well-maintained with stable paint layers.
Provenance
Probably in the collection of the artist, Antwerp, until his death in 1640 and then included in a large lot of oil sketches in his estate sale, 1642 [Jeffrey M. Muller, “Oil-Sketches in Rubens’s Collection,” Burlington Magazine 117 (1975), pp. 374-75, and Held 1980, p. 11, argue that the oil sketches were disposed of in this way]. Probably Jean van Lancker, Antwerp; his estate sale, Antwerp, 23 May, 1769 and following days, lot 72, “Une belle Esquisse, un Sanctuaire au milieu de 4 petites pieces jointes ensemble, Rubens, B[ois], 13 x 12. Canon Pierre André Joseph Knyff, Antwerp (died 1784), his estate sale, Antwerp, J. Grange, 18 July 1785 and following days, lot 74, “Un Autel enrichi d’ornemens & de colonnes, sur lequel est, représentée l’Adoration de l’Eucharistie: à droite, on voit le Pape à genoux, qui offre de l’encens; il est accompagné de Diàcres, de Prêtres & de beaucoup d’autres figures; à gauches sont l’Empereur, un Roi, des Princes, & plusieurs autres personnes, qui adorent le Saint Sacrement, au-dessus duquel on apperçoit un grand nombre d’Anges qui jouent des instrumens. Dans cette belle esquisse bien terminée et bien coloriée, l’on remarque beaucoup de finesse & de vérité. 11 ½ x 11 3/4 . B[ois]”, to Giraud, according to annotated catalogue in the RKD, The Hague]. Dowdeswell Galleries, London, by 1914, when sold to Martin A. Ryerson [an invoice from Dowdeswell to Ryerson is dated June 23, 1914]; Martin A. Ryerson, Chicago (1856–1932), from 1914; by descent to his wife Carrie Hutchinson Ryerson (1859–1937), Chicago, 1932 [Last Will and Testament of Martin A. Ryerson, Died August 11, 1932, copy in Institutional Archives, Art Institute of Chicago]; bequeathed to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1937.
