Set of four enamelled silver plaquettes

These sculptural reliefs (2015.388.1–.4) display extraordinary, jewel-like enameling accomplished through an innovative technique involving molten glass paste built up over an armature of gold wires on a silver base. In expressive detail, they represent four scenes of Christ’s Passion at a tiny scale—fully appreciable only to those privileged enough to view the reliefs at close range. (The compositions owe more than a little to the Small Passion print series by the famous Northern Renaissance master Albrecht Dürer.) Expensive as they were, the plaques would have been worth only a fraction of the treasure in the container they decorated: most likely some lost relic, imbued with spiritual power and believed to bridge our world with the divine.

Credit: Purchase, Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Acquisitions Fund, 2015