Northern Renaissance Oil Painting

Netherlands

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Ghent, Belgium

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Oil Painting

ground pigments suspended in linseed oil and/or without oil

• wood panel support, slow drying time

• animal hair brushes: sable, badger, squirrel

Glazing

overlaying translucent layers

Jan Van Eyeck

known for work in Northern Europe Renaissance

• had a keen eye for painting

Alterpiece

an artwork such as a painting, sculpture, or relief representing a religious subject made for placing at the back of or behind an alter

The Ghent Alterpiece - Jan & Hubert Van Eyeck (outside)

1432, oil on wood panel, Netherlands, Northern Renaissance

• outside top, Mary is visited by Gabriel with pregnancy news

• Mary is depicted in a typical Ghent house, and aspect of humanism, taking places the audience would understand

• outside bottom, the donors of the painting are depicted

The Ghent Alterpiece - Jan & Hubert Van Eyeck (inside)

1432, oil on wood panel, Netherlands, Northern Renaissance

• God is depicted in the middle, with Mary & John by his side

• God, stern look, adorned in jewels on a throne, holding a scepter with a crown at his feet

• Mary, idealized, crown of white lilies (purity) and red roses (without thorns), rays of light for holiness, blue garments for wealth, hold a bible

• on both sides Adam & Eve look into the scene, nude

• Adam was practically stepping out of the painting, with a tan

• Eve is seen eating fruit and pregnant to show her fertility

The Ghent Alterpiece - Jan & Hubert Van Eyeck (lower section)

• Lower section: adaption of the mystic lamb, (lamb is Jesus)

• all the nuns, monks, and priests are all converging to the lamb

• angels are swinging around the lamb who is bleeding into the holy grail

• gold rays emit from the lamb from holiness

• most stolen paintings during wars

Garden of Earthly Delights - Hieronymus Bosch

c 1500, oil on wood panel, Netherlands, Northern Renaissance. Suggests earth as it was formed, with God looking down (grayscale)

• Left: God in the center with Adam & Eve on his sides in the Garden of Eden, filled with strange animal creatures

• Center: structures and animals from imagination with people in odd interactions doing odd poses. Ideas: explosion of human lust (food and sex), moral judgment of people now suffering from their sins

• Right: a vision of hell, everything is tortuous with a city burning down. Instruments are seen as sinful due to music