What is the full name of the person who commissioned metalsmiths to produce modern versions, or copies, of a variety of medieval artworks?
Boxwood miniatures seemed to have served three original functions: aids to private devotion, luxury objects of status, and novel playthings. Later they became precious family heirlooms passed from generation to generation, but as medieval art fell out of fashion in the early modern period, their provenance was often lost. The earliest record of a collection is the 1598 inventory of the dukes of Bavaria, which contain several boxwood miniatures.Of the surviving works, over one hundred re-emerged in the 19th century Parisian antiquarian market, then the leading market for medieval art. During this period, they were acquired by collectors such as the British collector Richard Wallace (1818–1890), who purchased Count van Nieuwerkerke's (1811–1892) entire collection, including two boxwood prayer nuts, the Vienna-born collector of objets d'art Frédéric Spitzer (1815−1890), and Ferdinand de Rothschild (1839–1898). Spitzer was not a purist and commissioned metalsmiths to produce modern versions, or copies, of a variety of medieval artworks. Today, there are four surviving boxwood carvings he had augmented for the market.When the American financier J. P. Morgan purchased Baron Albert Oppenheim's collection in 1906, he acquired four boxwood miniatures, including a triptych with the Crucifixion and Resurrection, and a prayer nut showing the Carrying of the Cross, all of which are now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The Canadian publishing magnate Kenneth Thomson was an important collector for over 50 years, and his collection included the world's largest gathering of boxwood miniatures, including two skulls, two triptychs, and six prayer beads. These were bequeathed to the Art Gallery of Ontario, along with three other works collected by his family after his death.
Frédéric Spitzer