Location
Germany, Baden-Württemberg, Göppingen
Museum im Storchen
Artwork
St Joseph with Jesus in Göppingen
Type
Sculpture
Dimensions
Height: 108 cm, width: 60 cm, depth: 33 cm
Critical History
The statue of St Joseph with the infant Jesus was purchased by the city museum of Göppingen in the 1970s from art dealer A. Mehringer, Munich;1 since then it has been part of the permanent exhibition of the museum (Göppingen, Museum im Storchen, Inv. 71/19). The sculpture made its first appearance on the art market in Munich in the exhibition of the auction house Rudolf Neumeister in Munich in 1966, where it was attributed to an unknown master from the Middle Rhine region.2 Only some time later was the attribution to Philipp Jakob Straub proposed due to stylistic resemblance to the work of the latter. Dating ranges from around 1750 to 1755/60, Horst Schweigert suggested that the artist created the sculpture during his mature period after his work in Ehrenhausen.3 The fact is, that most comparable works by Philipp Jakob Straub such as in Ehrenhausen (ca. 1752–1760) or in Maria Lebing, Hartberg (1747–1749) are only attributed to him, with no archival evidence to strengthen the argumentation. But there is indeed a strong "family resemblance" to the works of Philipp Jakob and also of Joseph, e.g. St Joseph in Štanjel (Slovenia).4 Joseph's St John the Baptist in the Maribor Regional Museum is also quite close in some details but much more expressive. A wooden bozzetto (fig. 5) has been connected with the sculpture of St Joseph in Göppingen too.5 But it differs in some important details, most prominent is the divergent function of the left arm. While the arm of Joseph in the bozzetto was meant to hold some attribute, in Göppingen the arm and hand are raised in an expressive gesture.
Construction / Execution
The sculpture is made from one piece of limewood, on the back a deepening was carved out with a gouge. The figure of St Joseph is standing on a rectangular plinth. The original polychromy must have been removed some time before the object came to the museum.
Components
- Sculpture
- Author: Philipp Jakob Straub (Wiesensteig 1706 – Graz 1774)
- Completed: ca. 1750 – ca. 1760
- Technique(s): wood carving
- Material(s): wood
Images
- St Joseph, Göppingen, Museum im Storchen, Inv. 71/19 (photo by Julia Strobl, 2018)
- St Joseph, detail with the infant Christ (photo by Julia Strobl, 2018)
- St Joseph, detail of the head (photo by Julia Strobl, 2018)
- St Joseph, detail of the head (photo by Julia Strobl, 2018)
- Bozzetto, St Joseph, attributed to Philipp Jakob Straub, 1760 (sales cat. S. Mehringer, 1987, no. 6)
Catalogue entry prepared by Julia Strobl
Recommended citation: Julia Strobl, St Joseph with Jesus in Göppingen, in: TrArS – Tracing the Art of the Straub Family, 2018, (accessed 21/10/2025) URL
