This half-length figure of an Apostle, executed in the mid 1470s, once comprised the predella of a multipart altarpiece. One of the most distinctive Italian artists of his generation, Carlo Crivelli depicts the saint with characteristic verve. Animated and emphatically unidealized, the young man appears to be in the middle of a heated scriptural debate. The artist's vigorous draftsmanship, coupled with his emotionally charged use of color and emphasis on intensity of expression, are hallmarks of Crivelli's unmistakable and idiosyncratic style.

Fig. 1 Carlo Crivelli, Christ the Redeemer, tempera on panel, gold ground. El Paso Museum of Art, inv. no. K336B.

Together with depictions of the eleven other Apostles, who flanked a central figure of Christ, the present work formed the bottom tier of a three-level polyptych, structurally similar to Crivelli's 1473 altarpiece in the Church of Saint Emidio, Ascoli Piceno. In 1976, Federico Zeri identified several panels with similar dimensions, formats, and punchwork that made up the predella.1 To date, seven pieces (including the present work) are known: Christ the Redeemer at the El Paso Museum of Art (fig. 1); Saint Bartholomew and Saint John the Evangelist at the Castello Sforzesco, Milan (figs. 2, 3); Saint Peter at the Yale University Art Gallery (fig. 4); Saint Andrew formerly in the Proehl collects ion, Amsterdam (fig. 5); and Saint James the Greater in the Pittas collects ion (fig. 6). Even as each Apostle exists within a self-contained space, together they form a fraternity of animated debaters. Such physical liveliness both indicated the strength of their religious convictions and evinced the passions of their souls, understood at the t.mes as expressed through bodily movement.

Left to Right: Fig. 2 Carlo Crivelli, Saint Bartholomew, tempera on panel, gold ground. Milan, Castello Sforzesco, inv. no. 33/1; Fig. 3 Carlo Crivelli, Saint John the Evangelist, tempera on panel, gold ground. Milan, Castello Sforzesco, inv. no. 33/2; Fig. 4 Carlo Crivelli, Saint Peter, tempera on panel, gold ground. New Haven, Yale University Art Gallery, inv. no. 1959.15.15; Fig. 5 Carlo Crivelli, Saint Andrew, tempera on panel, gold ground. Formerly Amsterdam, Proehl collects ion; Present Lot; Fig. 6 Carlo Crivelli, Saint James the Greater, tempera on panel, gold ground. Pittas collects ion.

Various scholars have offered proposals reconstructing the now-dismembered altarpiece. While no consensus has yet been reached, the predella panels have been associated with several commissions, including the polyptych Crivelli painted for the Church of San Francesco, Montefiore dell'Aso; the so-called Fesch-Erickson polyptych painted in 1472, likely for the Church of San Domenico, Fermo;2 and the 1476 polyptych formerly in the Church of San Domenico, Ascolo Piceno.3

1 F. Zeri, "Cinque schede per Carlo Crivelli," in Arte Antica e Moderna 13 (1961), pp. 158-176.
2 The central Madonna and Child Enthroned is today in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (inv. no. 1982.60.5).
3 The principal parts of which, known as the Demidoff Altarpiece are now in the National Gallery, London.