Southern Netherlands, second half of the 16th century Virtue: Humility or Piety Strong alabaster relief, back hollowed out Bears on the front of the drapery the initials "T" and "AL" added H. 160 cm Erosions of the epidermis, accidents and missing parts, old restorations to the nose, the left eyebrow arch and the lower lip Related literature: - De Reymaeker, 'A la (re)découverte de Jacques Du Broeucq,' and R. Didier, 'Les œuvres du sculpteur Jacques Du Broeucq,' in Jacques Du Broeucq, sculpteur et architecte de la Renaissance, ex. cat, Mons, 1985, pp. 11-30, 31-102; - Jacques du Broeucq de Mons (1505-1584), Maitre artiste de l'empereur Charles Quint, catalogue of the exhibition organised at the Salle Saint Georges and the Collégiale Sainte Waudru in Mons as well as at the funerary chapel of the Seigneurs de Bossu from 24 June to 2 October 2005, 2005; - Aleksandra Lipinskà, Moving sculptures. Southern Nethelandish Alabasters from the 16th to 17th centuries in Central and Northern Europe, Brill, Leiden, 2015; - E. M. Kavaler, F. Scholten, J. Woodall, Netherlandish Sculpture of the 16th century, Netherlands Yearbook for History of Art, no. 67, Brill, Leiden, Boston, 2017. By its material -alabaster-, its subject -the allegorical representation of a virtue- and its mannerist style, this imposing sculpture translates with refinement the specific artistic language of the Southern Netherlands in the second half of the 16th century. The evolution of funerary sculpture inspired by the architectural vocabulary of antiquity offered artists and architects a new breeding ground for creativity during the diffusion of the Italian Renaissance. The creation of true commemorative monuments offered a multiplicity of new plastic forms: recumbents, prayers, and trances to practice the art of portraiture, architectural elements and a palette of decorative motifs to transcribe the antique repertoire; allegorical figures framing the deceased or used as caryatids, increasingly replaced the cohort of saints of the medieval period. (cf. Michel Colombe, The Four Cardinal Virtues of the Tomb of the Dukes of Brittany François II and Marguerite de Foix, Nantes, 1502-1507, marble, Cathedral of Saint Peter and Saint Paul). The famous group of Virtues created between 1535 and 1549 by Jacques du Broeucq for the rood screen of the Collegiate Church of Saint Waudru in Mons is the origin of this specific craze for allegorical figures in the Southern Netherlands. Carved in alabaster - a preferred material in this region, competing with Italian marble - these female figures transpose the ideal canons of ancient beauty and a search for decorative detail and expression, while retaining their function as a support for Christian ethics. The influence of this Renaissance masterpiece on the sculpture of this region was primordial, taken up and spread by artists as famous for the promotion of the mannerist style, as Jean Mone or Cornelis Floris. Our beautiful sculpture fits perfectly into this refined and symbolic production: dressed in an antique dress with swirling draperies and sporting a rich hairdo, our Virtue presents, in her attitude and in the expression of her smooth face, an exemplary gentleness. Although she no longer has the attribute that would allow her to be identified, we can assume, thanks to her left hand slipped under the drapery and placed delicately on her right breast, that she represents Humility or Piety.